


Academics on Mages

by HistoryFreak_91



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age II, Dragon Age: Origins - Awakening
Genre: Angst and Fluff and Smut, Eventual Romance, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-11
Updated: 2017-09-30
Packaged: 2018-12-26 17:17:24
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 28,461
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12063507
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HistoryFreak_91/pseuds/HistoryFreak_91
Summary: This story takes place in Redcliffe between Dragon Age: Awakening and Dragon Age II.Viola is a maid and a scholar. Once she hears the news of an apostate staying at Redcliffe's inn, she musters the courage to ask him all the questions she had always wished to ask to a free mage.





	1. On Apostates

**Author's Note:**

> The story has only one NSFW chapter, the last.  
> Starting from a debate between Anders and Viola, the relationship grows into something more intimate. The debate ends at chapter 5 and no more points are brought to the plate in the last session as to allow the reader to partake into the academics without entering the NSFW chapter.

“Are you actually a mage?” The girl whispered, looking straight at the blond hair of the man sitting at the table, handling a dish of soup by gently leaving it in front of his face. The man slowly raised his head up to meet two big curious eyes studying him profoundly, as if they could be able to know the truth just by a simple stare.  
“And what if I am?” The man smirked dismissingly, moving his face down to his plate and going for the spoon.  
“Are you being chased?” The maid jolted slightly before taking a sit next to him, keeping on whispering while piercing into his skull. The mage turned to look at her with wide eyes.   
“Are all mages supposed to be chased, according to you?” He asked, the spoon left midair as he glanced at her serious expression.  
“Aren’t they?” She shrugged lightly before finally turning her face from him, looking all around as if to search for Templars. Anders looked at her suspiciously: she didn’t seem vicious nor scared but she looked quite anxious, almost eager. He sighed.  
“What are you searching for?” His voice was almost surrendered to what would’ve come next. “You want to handle me to the Templars?”  
“Mh?” The girl frowned before turning to look at him once more. “Oh, I…” She was torn: giving him to the Templars would’ve been the right thing to do, but talking with an apostate… it would have been an experience. Although many came to the inn, it was never easy to spot mages and, when they were spotted, the Templars were immediately called.   
Now, this one particular mage, this Anders, was being spared by the locals: he was a Grey Warden, they did say, friend of that one Hero of Ferelden who saved us all from the Fifth Blight, they did add, the same one who protected Redcliffe from destruction; especially, Bella protected the mage, as thanks to the Hero of Ferelden, and so he was free to stay at the inn, paying his charge as any normal customer, yes, but unspoken of to the Templars. Hence, Viola came to know of his identity and her curiosity won over her shyness, allowing her to start that conversation that played so many times inside her head during the last week.   
“You are an apostate.” Viola finally spoke and Anders stayed frozen, still uncertain on how to react.   
“What of it?” He tried to lighten up the mood and the girl actually chuckled, making the knot in his throat loosen up.  
“You are dangerous.” She looked at him with the sweetest eyes but her words sounded almost as if she was mocking him and the mage frowned.   
“Am I now?” He asked and the girl smiled once more.  
“Aren’t all mages dangerous?” Her tone of voice was innocent enough but Anders could understand that that was a rhetorical question.  
“Not necessarily.” He finally turned down to his plate and took a sip of his soup: it was… decent.  
“You can shoot… fireballs.” Viola tried to sound naïve but her look had changed into an inquiring gaze that almost made Anders choke on his meal.   
“And lighting too.” He joked, taking another sip as to hide his coughing. “That is, actually, my specialty.” He thought she’d smile again but the girl next to him kept her cold, investigating glare that made him feel so very uncomfortable, yet she didn’t add anything for quite some time, allowing him to eat his meal while her eyes searched every inch of his body, making him even more uneasy.   
“Where is your staff?” She asked all of a sudden while he was taking a sip of water from his cup. The mage slowly put down the object and turned to the girl with a smirk.  
“Now, if I would take that around with me, everybody would know that I am, indeed, a mage.” He thought so highly of himself for that remark that he expected the other to give him a victory point but she simply frowned and gently shook her head.  
“Everybody knows you are a mage.” Viola crossed her arms while he stopped once more from sipping from his cup. “I was just trying to get to you nicely.” Anders cleared his throat, admitting his defeat with an interior sigh. Viola paused for a couple instants more before continuing, unfolding her arms: “The people here believe you a good mage. You are, after all, a Grey Warden.”  
“I’d rather not talk about that.” Anders dismissed the subject, shaking his head while putting down his cup under the curious glaze of Viola.  
“Why not?” She asked, a bit confused. “Grey Wardens are heroes.”  
“Yes, they are that, sure.” The other kept trying to cut short the conversation. “But I am not willing to remember what they have to do to be such.” Viola stared at him for a few minutes more, unsure on what to say, before deciding to drop it: she was there to speak of mages, the Grey Wardens were another story entirely.   
“So, except from when you were with the Wardens, have you always been an apostate?” The way she said that word, apostate, made it sound like she almost feared it, as if that word alone could summarize everything that was wrong with it. Anders noticed that but couldn’t exactly understand if it was fear or, worse, disgust that her emphasis on the word entailed.   
“I have tried to be.” The man decided to reply, going back to what was left of his now cold soup. “I was given to the Circle at a young age.” A sad glimpse crossed his eyes for one second as he mustered if he should say out loud what thought had caused such distress. He decided that no, he didn’t trust the person enough to show her such a wound he carried, so deeply scarred into his heart, hence he shook his head and continued regardless: “I have tried and succeeded escaping the Circle times and times again.” He chuckled: “Of course, the Templars always got back to me.” He finally raised his eyes to meet the genuinely curious stare of the girl sitting next to him, her arms abandoned on her bended knees as she was leaning a bit towards him, entranced by his words. He swallowed a knot forming into his throat, wondering what was that strange feeling of uneasiness and yet pleasure in keeping the conversation going with this nameless maid. He suddenly realized that they hadn’t introduced properly and that it was the first time, in that week of stay at the inn of Redcliffe, that he had noticed her: altogether, images of her working the tables and softly moving through the customers appeared in his mind in flashes, as if awoken by his subconscious.   
“Isn’t it strange, though?” The voice of the girl suddenly awoke Anders from his contemplation and he shook his head, forcing himself to listen to what she was saying. “Shouldn’t the Templars have made you Tranquil by now?” Listening to that word made Anders’ whole body shake in a fit of anger.  
“Excuse me?” He asked, almost incredulous, while the girl was genuinely just contemplating the facts without a hint of maliciousness in her intentions.  
“Wouldn’t it have been a good reason why?” She spoke once more, treating the subject with extreme nonchalance. “A mage escaping the Circle multiple times… seems quite the reason to block his mind from the Fade.”  
“So, that would’ve been your solution?” Anders’ angry tone of voice made Viola suddenly turn her surprised gaze toward him, slowly realizing how touchless she had been during her last speech. “Depriving me of my mind? My dreams? My emotions?”  
“I… didn’t say that.” She tried to apologize but was unable to find the right words.  
“Is this the solution the Templars should apply?” Anders was trying to contain the volume of his voice but his words sounded like thunder in Viola’s ears. “Make mindless creatures of all mages who disobey?” The girl’s emotions switched when she heard that last sentence and her sorry look turned into a scolding one.  
“You did escape the Circle multiple times.” She replied, keeping her voice down. “It is not just a simple disobedience to the Templars, it’s disobeying to Ferelden’s law.”  
“And what if the law is wrong?” Anders felt Justice’s voice rising into his head but he forced himself to keep in control. “Should all mages be locked up just because of this fear non-mages have of us?” Viola looked at him almost in shock before stretching her lips and taking a deep breath.  
“Mages are dangerous.” She whispered, looking into Anders’ eyes with a freezing glance. “They can use blood magic and be possessed by demons.”  
“Not all mages use blood magic.” Anders frowned and the girl lightly shook her head, moving her eyes down to her knees.   
“But it is a resource for them, is it not?” She kept thinking about what she had heard, about what she knew, about the rituals, the innumerable killings that had to be done in order to complete them. She raised her hand. “They start with one cut…” she moved the nail of her thumb on her palm, as to picture a knife cutting the skin: “They have a taste of that power and then…” She closed her eyes, looking away while letting her hands fall onto her lap once more.   
“Why should I be charged of something I have never done?” Anders interrupted the girl’s mourning, forcing her to look up at him as he almost grinned his teeth.  
“You draw pacts with demons to achieve what you want.” She decided to continue and the mage filled his lungs with air, trying to keep Justice under control. “And then you get possessed.” Viola dryly chuckled: “No wonder we fear you.”   
“Then why have you come to talk to me if you fear mages so much?” The other finally spoke up and the maid looked intently into his eyes, making all of his rage strangely cool down.   
“I am a scholar.” Viola replied and Anders frowned. “I wanted to know how a mage… an apostate sees things.” The man stared at her in utter confusion and finally understood: yes, she feared him, deeply, yet her curiosity, her thirst of knowledge, mixed with a hint of empathy that, although not shown by her words, was so clear by the look in her eyes, made her win over that fear and almost forcefully got her to sit next to him and start that unpleasant conversation. But Anders knew better than that: he knew that if he wanted to seek justice for mages, non-mages had to participate too and they needed guidance and that one girl could’ve been the first step to achieving that goal. Finally, Anders felt calm again and released the air accumulated into his chest, closing his eyes for a few seconds to regain focus, feeling weary after all the energy he had to consume to keep Justice at bay.   
“You are a scholar…” He whispered, noticing how hard it was to speak after the adrenaline had shaken him so. Viola raised her big eyes and waited for him to continue. Anders finally moved his hand away from the bridge of his nose and met with her hopeful gaze, feeling his own entranced by such a contrasting personality. “What even is your name?”  
“Viola.” The girl replied hastily, not willing to talk about herself. Anders noticed as much but decided that he didn’t need to know more.   
“I am…”  
“Anders.” Listening to his name being spoken by the lips of the girl had a weird effect on him: she had said it with a weight that he had never felt before, not even when talked to by the First Enchanter; he could hear a great uncertainty in her voice, as if she had rehearsed that name over and over again to muster the courage to speak it and, now that the time had finally come, her voice still shook anxiously, of a fear unbeknownst to the mage who kept staring at the girl a great deal before feeling his head light and being forced to shake it to get a grip over himself.  
“Right.” He said at last. “That is my name.” He then stood up, mimicked by the girl who was still deeply entranced by him, willing to follow his every move, part of the reason why being her fear he could harm her at any point. “You want to speak of mages and Templars, don’t you?”  
“I want to speak of why an apostate does what he does, yes.” Viola nodded firmly, clenching her fists, fearing what might come of her request. “What he thinks, what he wants.” The girl stopped herself from talking, a strange twist forming into her stomach as goosebumps crossed all over her skin. Anders kept looking down to her and, the more he did so, the more tired he felt, as if something was trying to drag him to the ground to avoid him keeping that conversation going.  
“I will do it, but not now.” He looked around, circumspective, and Viola did the same. “Too many people.” The mage explained and the maid found herself nodding with her head, agreeing at the sight of the inn full of customers. “Come to me when there are less ears who might eavesdrop our conversation.”  
“Yes, sir.” The girl nodded, looking at the man directly in the eyes once more, making him uncomfortable again.  
“Right.” He hurriedly moved his gaze away, pretending to cough to hide his uneasiness, and started to move away, happy to have been able to mask his weariness with such a realistic excuse. Viola looked at him approaching the stairs to reach the second floor where the bedrooms were located: she still had something to say so she raised her hand and opened her mouth to call his name but, when she tried to do so, barely an “a” came out of her throat and her cheeks flushed vigorously. The girl withdrew a step and quickly lowered her hand to hide her mouth: it wasn’t the first time this happened to her, her shyness blocking her from saying something, but a name… She felt incredibly silly by that point and decided to give up, turning her shoulders to the mage and landing her gaze on his dish and cup. Viola looked at the objects with a candid glance, remembering the man eating next to her and feeling something warm enwrapping her stomach at the remembrance. She found herself smiling at that sensation and when she did she realized how naïve that was and shook her head, grabbing the objects to go clean them. She moved towards the kitchen but, before entering it, she turned around just for a couple seconds to look up the stairs, right where Anders had disappeared, then sighed before finally going back to her duties.  
 


	2. On Freedom and Tranquility

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The first proper academic showdown between the maid Viola and Anders touches the core of human rights: freedom. Why should mages be denied of it? Why should they suffer the limitations of the Circles? Why should they live being feared and in fear of others?  
> When Viola brings up the subject of Tranquility, Justice hardly contains himself.

A few days slipped by: the inn was always full of people of all kinds, making it impossible for Viola to catch Anders and speak to him for more than a couple minutes at a time, taking his order and looking at him with a tense glance. The mage kept feeling uneasy of the presence of that girl: she would stare at him at any moment, trying to understand if she could approach him and, especially, if she could trust him. She had this inane fear that he would leave before she could speak to him of the things she wanted to know and would take a sigh of release each time she saw him coming back from the front door. She then would immediately approach him and ask for his order while the other, certainly embarrassed by her insistence, secretly enjoyed her immediate service, almost feeling welcomed by a lovely wife each time he got back at the inn. Of course, he would keep denying such an idea, hearing Justice’s voice trying to reason with his mindless emotions and his lingering humane thoughts. He would contain himself from smiling, failing when the girl would turn her head elsewhere, and ask for his meal, taking always the cheapest one, the only thing he could afford. The girl would then come back, probably ignoring other tables, to serve his order and wish him a good meal, standing next to him for a few seconds to muster the courage to ask if everything was alright. It sounded so hard for her to say that and Anders couldn’t help but feel quite amused by that shyness as he replied that he was okay, she needn’t worry. Viola would retort that no, she wasn’t worrying, but the flush on her cheeks always betrayed her, making Anders give up and donate her a complacent smile, immediately followed by the girl excusing herself to work.   
After four days, Viola was exploding: she had so much to ask, so much to say and so much will to confront herself with the mage. She had rehearsed every word, every question, imagined so many different outcomes and her mind was starting to give in to the tiredness of those long awaken hours of solitary conversation. But what could she do if the inn was always full of people?   
On the fifth day, she started feeling defeated and when she brought the stew to Anders she just wished him a nice meal and left, without asking him if he was alright, her mind too tired to force her to win her shyness. The man felt an unexpected void as she was leaving, her expression sad and her steps long and grave. He looked at her for few seconds before turning to his meal and finally deciding what to do next. He ate as slowly as he possibly could and then waited for the night to fall and have the inn either full of drunkards or empty of people off to sleep. It became a half way: most of the customers left while a handful of drunkards stayed, raising blasphemous songs in the air.   
Viola tiredly came back from the kitchen with a plate, ready to retrieve some empty pints, when her jaded glaze landed on the blond man still sitting at his table, trying not to fall asleep. Her weary eyes suddenly sparked with a weird feeling of joy and she almost wanted to run to him but she contained herself and approached him while pressing the plate against her chest.   
“You’re still here.” She whispered with a sweet voice, result of her relief. Hearing that melodic tune, Anders turned his face up to meet her timid gaze and didn’t resist to smile lightly at how cute she was before shaking his head and forcing himself to not let his weakness for the opposite sex stop him from thinking straight.   
“I just decided to enjoy the warmth of the chimney… and the songs of the drunkards.” He chuckled jokingly but the girl seemed to actually believe him as she looked around, her eyes lingering toward the group of men and especially dwarves enjoying the night their own way: if that was what Anders liked, who was she to judge? Even so, she turned back to the man and calmly sat down in front of him, giving her back to those off-key singers and raising her relieved eyes toward the mage, happy to finally being able to speak to him some. Anders felt a shiver cross all over his spine and his breath slow down as she was laying her grey-blue eyes on him, the plate she was holding pressing against her chest, and he tried to hide his uncertainty with all his might.   
“So.” He cleared his throat and the girl took a deep breath to start with the first question before being interrupted by the continuation of the mage: “You want to deny all mages of their freedom. Why is that?” Viola frowned, her smile turning immediately into a confused grimace. She took some time to process the words that had been spoken to her, until she finally found a simple yet central answer.  
“Mages are dangerous.” She knew she had said that sentence before, but it seemed to her the only right thing to say in that very moment. Anders scoffed.  
“No more than any other man.” He replied, already feeling like he could win the argument with such a basic retort. “What is the difference between a sword, a knife, a bow, a club, a hammer and magic when they can all be turned to hurting and killing one another? Shouldn’t we all be equally caged?” Viola looked at the mage with a questioning look, that the man interpreted as a sign that she had never thought about what he had just said; but that was just false for the girl finally got the pieces back together and turned her confused look into the severe and cold expression that had frozen Anders multiple times already.  
“Non-mages cannot be possessed as easily. Demons don’t find them as appealing.” She replied dryly, quite disappointed that Anders hadn’t seen that coming. “And they cannot resort to blood magic when put on the spot.”  
“Not all mages do that.” Anders interrupted her, hating that idea.  
“But many do.” Viola retorted immediately. “Should we not fear them for this?”  
“If you wouldn’t put mages on the spot, they wouldn’t have a reason to resort to such a hideous act.” This time, the mage’s response actually made the girl stop to think a bit: she had studied so much about mages, Templars, Seekers and read many argumentative books regarding the precarious balance of Thedas; the answer to Anders’ words could definitely be found in one of them.  
“It is because mages can commit such acts that we are forced to restrain them in a way or another.” Viola got to reply and Anders scoffed once more.  
“Don’t you see this is a vicious cycle?” He sighed, scratching the bridge of his nose. “You take people away from their families because they were born different from you, naturally more powerful; you lock them up, hoping to never have to face their power, depriving them of their freedom, of their choices; and then you are surprised when we try to escape? When we try to regain what is ours? Our own lives?” The mage felt like he was being pretty convincing but Viola seemed unfazed.   
“It is for everyone’s sake.” She replied calmly, her severe eyes piercing into Anders’. “What if the mages is unable to control themselves, or worse: what if they get trapped into the Fade?” The man’s expression suddenly changed: how did this girl know this much? “If left alone, mages are not just a danger to everyone around them but also a danger to themselves. Do you actually believe, inside your heart, that all born with the gift of magic are actually able to handle it?” Anders was dumbfounded by that question but managed to keep a pretty concentrated expression due to one word the woman had said: gift. Was that how she saw it or was it just a slip of the tongue?  
“Of course, some mages need training.” The man admitted, giving the girl in front of him a feeling of relief, before continuing: “But that can easily be done outside of the prison of the Circle.”   
“So you would leave it to chance? Fate?” The girl smirked: “Let’s get some random mage, give him a handful of children and hope he doesn’t use them for some ritual and is able to protect them alone from demons, without the help of the Templars?”  
“Do you actually believe the Templars able to restrict mages so easily?” Anders was baffled by the girl’s assumption and she felt quite irritated by such weak consideration of her intelligence.  
“They can cut you off from the Fade, can’t they?” She hissed, almost angrily, trying to hit a nerve that indeed made the mage cringe in pain, causing him to lose part of the control he was using over himself to not allow the whole conversation to take a bad turn. By that point, it was too late.  
“Right, they can.” The mage nodded, piercing his eyes in hers. “And I seem to understand that you find it a humane thing to do.” Viola stared at the man in front of her quite a bit, trying to understand where he was trying to get to: his eyes were growing colder with each second, as if something was taking over him slowly and inexorably, but at the same time he seemed eager to get an answer to his affirmation, as if ready to bite back. Viola decided to satisfy his interest.  
“Definitely better than death.” She finally answered and Anders shook his head.  
“No, it is not.” He replied, his brown eyes now softer, almost painful to watch. “You keep your life, yes, but what life is it? You are nobody anymore: no memories, no feelings, no… goal.” He chuckled to suffocate his suffering at the mere thought. “What would there be to live for?”  
“At least Tranquils are useful.” Viola interrupted that moment of sorrow to take the discussion on a more practical level. “They can practice enchantment and help mages and non-mages with very important tasks.” She tried to recall some examples but decided that the words she had spoken were enough to prove her point. “A dead man is dead. A Tranquil is, at least, a help to the community.” Anders couldn’t believe his ears.  
“Should mages only exist to serve and be ignored as people, as human beings?” He felt anger mix with his sadness and the pain became almost unbearable. “Should they give up themselves, their lives, their freedom, just because they were born different?”  
“You speak of freedom, of choices as if they were real.” The words of the girl made the man frown as he titled his head on the side, feeling his emotions suddenly soften as he saw those of the girl rise up as a torment. “The truth is that no one of us is free.” The grip of the girl over the plate that was now resting on her legs tightened as she spoke trying to contain her own anger, an anger that had nothing to do with mages but had grown over the years. “What choices do we have? Do you think that, just because we are not born with the gift of magic, we are happier than you?” She smirked. “Sure, it is a different fate, but isn’t the soldier nothing more than a suffering Tranquil?” Viola finally raised her eyes again to meet Anders’ puzzled look. She parted her lips as she spoke softly: “They are taught to feel no emotion, to obey every order without questioning, to meet their end when the time is nigh; where is the difference in that?” The girl suddenly stood up, facing Anders directly, making the man tense up, almost feeling physically attacked. “The only difference is that those soldiers feel pain when they do what they do, regret, remorse…”  
“No.” Anders interrupted her with a whisper, standing and moving one step forward, towering over the maid who felt, all of a sudden, incredibly small. “The real difference is that they have a choice: a choice to run, to turn their back to a wrong order, to revolt. The Tranquil… the Tranquil has no choice.” Viola smirked.  
“You call those choices?” She took a deep breath, able to stand her ground in front of the taller man. “Betray your homeland? Your King? Your brethren?”   
“It is a choice.” Anders felt Justice rising up inside his mind. “When the cause is wrong, a man has to know where he stands.” Viola looked at the changing eyes of the man in front of her before replying:  
“And do you call this… just?” At the sound of the word, Anders hurriedly tried to take back control of his body while the spirit was forcing himself from the inside of him.   
“Viola!” The sudden thundering voice of the inn’s keeper interrupted both the speakers, making them turn toward the redhead who was looking harshly at the maid while rushing toward her. “The customers require your service.” She scolded her, indicating the table full of empty mugs of the human-dwarven group. Viola internally sighed as she lowered her head in a nod.  
“Yes, madam.” She replied quickly but didn’t move an inch from where she stood, staring at Bella who looked at her and then at the mage next to them, sighing profoundly after doing so.   
“Not one minute more.” Bella warned the maid and left while Viola waited for her to be far enough before turning toward the mage who seemed suddenly pale.   
“Are you okay?” She asked mindlessly, unable to restrain herself. Anders shook his head.   
“I am just dizzy.” He replied and the girl sighed in relief before looking back up at him.  
“You should rest, then.” She advised calmly, turning the plate to ready it for the mugs she had to retrieve. “I wish you a goodnight.” Her voice seemed quite plain but a sentiment of real compassion could still be hinted deep inside.   
Anders looked at the girl incredulously: they just had had a terrible spat, disagreed on every single point risen, made each other angry beyond any reasonable measure and yet she was worried for him? Justice had almost unleashed his fury on the poor girl and yet Anders had been able to control him and now, although deeply shaken, he felt something he didn’t expect to ever find after such a situation: respect. Although every single word that had come out from that girl’s mouth had done nothing but bring him down from his purpose of convincing her of the goodness in mages, he felt like he couldn’t ignore the passion, the knowledge, the deeper reasoning that had led her to hold such an opinion on the delicate matter of the balance of magic in the world. He felt, although, that there was something more to it, something that she was still holding onto that would have clarified why did she have studied the matter so profoundly; and this sole feeling was what brought Anders to stay more, after having resolved of leaving when Justice had pushed him to the limit, just so that he could finally understand what had brought that girl to speak as she had done that night. He looked at her, her gentle movements as she was managing to pick up all the used mugs trying to avoid the uncouth men from touching her even by mistake, and he thought how much of a shame it was that such a delicate girl would work in such a low place. Anders smirked at himself, unable to believe that that was the thing that was crossing his mind after what had happened that night. Giving up on himself, he sighed and started walking toward the stairs that brought him to the second floor, where his deserved sleep was waiting for him in the soft arms of his covers and pillows.   
 


	3. On Power

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hastily recapping some of the points already made, Viola and Anders discuss the place of mages in a hypothetical free environment. Would a new Tevinter Imperium rise? Would non-mages have a place in it?  
> Viola seems shaken at the mere thought, causing Anders to wonder what's behind her claim of speaking to him for sole academic curiosity.

The commotion from the previous days slowly began to fade and the inn started to empty itself, prospecting the chance of a continuation of the conversation that had happened between the scholar and the mage a couple days prior. This time, Viola wouldn’t have allowed Anders to lead the discussion as he had done in the previous occasion: he had struck her down with surprise and caused her quite a bit of panic, making all of the conversations she had played inside her mind vain, making her lose focus and be unable to reply accordingly and appropriately. This time, it would’ve been different.  
“So then.” She started, accompanied by the thud of a big book hitting the table, making Anders jolt in utter surprise. The mage raised his hands in front of him in a protective manner and looked up with widened eyes, meeting the severe look of the girl staring directly into his soul, as sharp as a razor. “The Chant of Light.” At those words, Anders looked down for a second: yes, that was the book, alright. Viola hurriedly opened the page where she had kept a stripe of leather as bookmark, pointing at some words. The mage leaned forward, starting to feel calmer, as she read out loud: “Magic should serve man, not rule over him.” Anders read the words as she spoke them, then slowly turned toward the girl with a concerned look.  
“Did you really need to bring the Chant of Light to remember such a basic concept?” He commented swiftly, his voice slick and inquisitive of the other’s wits. Viola blushed at the realization that her showdown might have just made her look sillier than she had imagined. She cleared her throat, trying and failing to hide her utter embarrassment.  
“Of course not.” She swallowed, trying to get rid of the knot inside her throat, but to no avail. “I was just trying to back up my point.” She hurriedly continued, hastily closing the Chant of Light and picking it up into her arms. Anders playfully looked at her struggle, a complacent smile on his face, only sweetened by the admission of how adorable that failure had been, and lastly decided to stop teasing her.  
“Your point being?” He asked instead, accommodating himself more comfortably in his chair, receiving a curious look by the maid’s wide open eyes for she had expected him to mock her further. Viola shook her head quickly, trying to regain focus once more, and took a breath that gave her resolution, making that knot in her throat finally start to dissolve and allow her to speak, as she reached for the chair in front of the mage:  
“As the Chant of Light states, magic should be used by men and not…” She stopped, looking once more at the complacent glance of the man in front of her, who was struggling not to laugh in front of his sparring partner’s attempt to paraphrase the Chant’s words. Viola sighed: “But you already know this.” She gave up: all that speech she had rehearsed for so long was nothing but a useless showcase of information Anders had certainly known to begin with. So she took a deep breath and tried to proceed from where she would’ve left off after her academic speech: “So…what is your stance?” She asked timidly before adding in a more resolute tone: “How would the mages use their power, their influence, if they were free?”  
“Well…” Anders leaned forward, joining the tips of his fingers together. “I have yet to see a mage who wants to rule anything.” Viola snorted.  
“You can’t be this naïve.” She shook her head with a smirk, making Anders a bit less sure of himself.  
“What’s so naïve about it?” He replied shortly, straightening his back. “With how many mages have you spoken to know that it isn’t so?” The girl couldn’t believe her ears.  
“With how many mages have you spoken… no, scratch that: with how many people have you spoken to think that they wouldn’t want to rule over anything?” This time it was Viola’s turn to lean forward, resting her clasped hands on the wooden table, a smug smile crossing her face. “Free people want power. All of them.”  
“Not all of them.” Anders interrupted her, frowning. “I don’t.” Viola’s glance softened at those words, almost caressing the other’s man face.  
“Alright.” She decided not to interfere. “Let’s say you don’t. And I don’t either.” She waited for a second before continuing, expecting some kind of retort from the mage, but he remained silent and so she continued: “But you must’ve seen men, how they act, how they behave.” For one second, Anders believed that the girl was speaking directly to Justice and he shivered at the thought. “They are irrational, yet scheming; they need few to survive, yet want more, so much more that they become corrupted by their own desires.” The girl sighed and the man kept feeling this uneasiness becoming more and more heavy on his chest until Viola raised her sharp eyes on his, piercing his chest from side to side: “How long until these desires turn into greediness, corrupting mages, making them easy preys of demons?”  
“Demons again?” Anders couldn’t help himself, shaking off the uncomfortableness from his shoulders as he tried to change the subject to a more mundane one. “Is it the only thing you can talk about?”  
“I…” The girl remained interdicted for a couple seconds before frowning. “That isn’t the only point I make.”  
“Yet we are talking about it, again.” The mage sighed and laid back in his chair, abandoning his arms to the sides. “Fine: mages can be possessed easily. Good point, but it’s not like it doesn’t happen already. But!” The man raised his voice, making the girl jolt, before realizing that he might have exaggerated and continuing with a softer tone, leaning toward the table. “Less mages would give in to demons if they had freedom.” Viola seemed puzzled.  
“How’s that?” She decided to ask, genuinely curious of the mage’s answer.  
“They wouldn’t feel the need to.” He explained with an impatient hand gesture. “They would have so much more to live for, so many choices. They wouldn’t feel the pressure, the oppression telling them that that is their only salvation, the only way they can try to eliminate their pain, either by dying by the hands of the demon or destroying what they hated and then be killed in return.”  
“They would keep feeling the pressure.” Viola decided to intervene. “It would be a different pressure, a subtler one, maybe, but also a more demanding one: keeping up with the needs of the world, the needs of all men but outside, in an unforgiving environment that offers no shelter and has no indicative path.” The girl paused for a second to take a breath, while the man looked at her wondering what pain she might have had endured to feel that way, to seemingly prefer imprisonment to a life of adventure, a life of possibilities. “How many souls would be lost to the vastness that the world offers?”  
“They would manage.” Anders cut short, unable to see the implications of the point risen by the scholar. “As any other man does.” Viola frowned.  
“Any other man?” She scoffed. “We are pushed from all sides by forces that we are unable to control, that veer us from what we wish, from what we want, sometimes even from what we need.” The girl’s cosmic pessimism was still unable to break the other man’s spirit, but it managed to make a breach into his assuredness. He was actually unable to respond to such affirmation but Viola didn’t seem to notice: she just thought that her tangent had just gone too far and forced herself to get back on track, raising her eyes to face the ones of her interlocutor once more. “How would mages react to it if not by appealing to their most powerful resources?”  
“I am telling you, not all mages are like that.” Anders felt like they were back to point A and instantly regained his focus. “Why do you think us all corrupt?”  
“I don’t think you corrupt.” The girl hurriedly clarified. “I only think that you can become easily corrupted by powers that you can’t possibly control. Immoral powers, that is, that bring doom not just to yourself but to us all.”  
“It’s that easily that puts you off.” The mage replied, still calmly but starting to feel a bit of agitation. “Do you think we do not know what are the risks? That we happily make pacts with demons or use blood magic without thinking of the consequences, of the implications? I have chosen to never resort to any of those things. Like me, many others. Should I be punished of acts I do not commit?”  
“For one like you there are thousands like them.” Viola’s voice sounded sincerely sorry as she spoke those words, surrendered even.  
“That is where you are wrong!” Anders slightly raised his tone of voice, making the girl look up into those sorrowful eyes. “For one like them there are thousands like me!” He almost wanted to shout but he contained himself, just slightly rising up from his chair. “We don’t want to use blood magic, we don’t want to make pacts with demons, even less be possessed by them!” The girl kept staring at him with the same painful expression, as if the words were unable to be processed by her mind. “Those who resort to those practices… we condemn them too! Viola.” At hearing her name, the girl felt a shiver crossing all over her body: her widened eyes stared at Anders’ in utter surprise, almost in shock, as he continued with the most tortured expression she had ever seen. “Don’t tell me you can’t see? Don’t tell me you really think us so power thirsty that you believe we just want to see the world burn?”  
“I…” The girl whispered: no, she didn’t believe that, that wasn’t it. She didn’t fear the mages to destroy everything, she never did and never would’ve had. What she feared was more immediate, more mundane, possibly less scary but still upsetting and inconceivable. “I don’t think that.” She admitted, raising her sparkling eyes toward the man who felt his heart skip a beat as he witnessed the scholar still doubting. “But you can’t deny how much the world would change if the mages were free.”  
“Why is it bad?” The man went back to sitting, starting to feel very close to giving in.  
“Magic should serve man, not rule over him.” Viola repeated after a short pause, trying to recollect her thoughts, her glance turned to the ground, examining the wooden planks that formed the inn’s floor. “You say that mages do not want to rule…”  
“Because it is the truth.” Anders interrupted the girl’s speech and she bitterly smiled.  
“You admitted it yourself: many mages wouldn’t resort to blood magic, but some would.” Viola turned her gaze up to the mage in front of her, that sad smile still on her lips. “Can’t the same be said of mages who would want to rise to power?” At that remark, Anders remained petrified for a couple seconds, unsure on what to say next. Viola’s bitter smirk widened for just a second before she turned her face elsewhere. “Then Ferelden would slowly start to become just like the Tevinter Imperium.”  
“That wouldn’t happen.” Anders tried to dismiss the other’s fears but Viola was unfazed.  
“Do you actually think we could cooperate? Mages and non-mages?” The girl tried to make her question sound less rhetorical than it was actually intended to be.  
“We could try.” The other man’s answer wished to sound genuine but it came out naïve, so much so that the maid couldn’t help but bitterly smile once more.  
“How could that ever happen?” She shrugged. “With time, nothing would stop the mages to rise and an escalation could take to a war that would make all the equality talks disappear. And it would be, once more, you against us, us against you. And you would win, resorting to those arts you claim to despise, because the lives of many are more important than the one of a single soul.”  
“Not this again…” Anders hissed between his lips and the girl felt offended by his utter will to deny the possibility.  
“Avoid this topic as much as you will, it won’t make me drop my point.” She froze him with a cold glance that made the other man shiver before taking a deep breath and trying to reason with the girl just once more.  
“Listen, say all you want but this whole situation must change.” He appealed to all the willpower he had left. “Mages can’t keep being separated from their families, locked, made Tranquil, used as tools or killed by Templars any longer. It is unjust.”  
“It is necessary.” Viola cut him short so abruptly that Anders remained interdicted for a couple seconds, allowing the girl to glance at him before turning away once more, her expression changing into a sorry one. Anders caught that, causing all the anger that had started boiling into his veins to rapidly dissipate: so he had been able to breach into her heart, at least a bit, did he not? The fact that he had noticed that pained expression was the only thing that had stopped Justice to act and explode into an outburst; instead, Anders felt an incredible pain to be found in the girl sitting in front of him, and his profound wish to ease it banished Justice to act for him.  
“Viola…” He tried to reach for her but the girl couldn’t bear to hear him say her name any longer. She withdrew, standing from her chair, quickly grabbing the Chant of Light in her arms before it could fall from her lap. Anders’ hand froze midair when he understood that there was a line he shouldn’t cross. He retreated it slowly, trying to figure what else to say. He stood slowly but his movement made Viola withdraw another step: he had never seen her this tense and didn’t know how to act in front of such distress.  
“I must go.” The girl suddenly managed to say, unable to bear that silence any longer while Anders cursed himself for failing to find the words he was looking for. They both stood there for some seconds, wishing to find a better way to depart, but the air had become too heavy and, at last, Viola gave up trying and, holding the book to her chest, left, followed by the sorry look of an anguished Anders.


	4. On Non-Mages Treatment

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Anders keeps interrogating himself of the motivations that bring his sparring partner to be so hateful toward mages and manages to get some answers this time around: Viola finally opens up about her background and the relationship between the two reaches a new point that allows them to speak more clearly.

After the abrupt way the two had departed the day prior, Anders kept wishing to find a way to get things sorted out: yes, the two were very different, had different backgrounds, completely different ideas on the matter at hand, but while they kept on talking about it, he realized that both had risen points able to make a breakthrough into each other’s minds. Although Anders couldn’t even dare to imagine a world ruled by solely mages, he had to admit that the point risen by the other girl still stood: what if the mages would get to power and Ferelden, Orlais, the Free Marches, Nevarra, Antiva… what if all of them would turn their political class into just mages? Sure, it sounded impossible, especially after such a long time, but the idea the girl had was not so farfetched and it could sound frightening, especially with an example like the Tevinter Imperium. Although he could understand the point of view of a non-mage, as Viola was, he still believed that she had become unable to ignore the claim to freedom that Anders was preaching, if not for all mages, at least for part of them. It wasn’t enough, the mage knew as much, but it was still progress, progress that could’ve been made by other people too.   
The man stood from the bed, he dressed up after shaving, a thing that he didn’t liken to do much often, and exited his room. He began walking toward the stairs while facing the window that showed the back of the inn where he had a glimpse of white sheets softly moving against the breeze. He stopped for a second and saw the light-brown haired woman tending to the laundry. Listening closely, he could also hear her sing a sweet melody, an elven anthem usually sung in taverns, in the common tongue. Hearing that adorable voice brought a smile on his face, especially comparing to the usually dry tone he was used to hear, while he decided what to do next: he quickly walked down the stairs and, making sure the innkeeper didn’t notice him, he exited the place from the backdoor, finding himself right in front of the maid, her back turned toward him.  
He waited for her to stop singing but hurriedly decided to say something before she could notice his presence and realize that he had stalked her for the last couple minutes.  
“Can I speak to you?” The mage tried to belittle the huge smile that had crossed his face for quite some time, while the girl jumped in surprise, her heart pumping in shock: how long had he been there? Did he hear her? What did he want? Unable to hide the flush on her cheeks, the girl tried to find the courage to say something but her voice didn’t want to come out.  
“What do you want?” She harshly mumbled, trying to cut short the silence that greatly amused Anders instead, making him keep a smug yet adoring smile on his face. He watched Viola bend on the wet sheets, trying to keep herself busy in the hope of regaining some composure, the long braid falling on her shoulder, hiding part of the mouth as much as her bangs hid her eyes. The mage made some steps forward, almost circling around the girl who, incredibly uncomfortable, was still unable to talk and couldn’t ask him to back off. She was so immersed in her awkwardness that she didn’t realize that the look in the man’s eyes had changed from mocking to one of reassurance and comprehension.  
“Listen, about last night…” The mage started whispering and began feeling uneasy himself, as if he didn’t really know what to say. Once he was aware of his awkwardness, he tried to clear his throat and forced himself not to babble. “I-I don’t know what happened to you.” ‘Oh, well done, Anders, way to make a fool of yourself’, he cursed himself for his incapability of controlling his emotions in that particular moment. “I mean…” He looked at the girl who was keeping on working: she was still too embarrassed to notice the struggle of the one who was talking to her, which gave Anders the possibility of getting more resolute and finally continuing, with a stiller voice: “Why are you so angry at mages?” He finally did say it but hurriedly added: “Besides that we are dangerous and all that.” He looked at Viola slowing down her movements as she lowered her head a bit, finally listening. “I know you have more personal reasons than what you entailed until now.” The mage mustered the courage to expose what had made him so curious in the last few days. “Did something happen to you, personally?” He kept insisting, seeing how the other girl had stopped attending to her chore to listen. “Did someone…” Anders felt his heart aching as he continued his question: “Did some mage ever… hurt you?” There was a pause, and a long one at that. Anders kept on staring at the girl, feeling like time had stopped: he looked at her blank expression as she stared at the sheet she was holding between her pale hands, at her mouth left semi-opened while her nostrils slowly moved in an attempt to catch air, while locks of hair curled around her puffy face, unkempt from the restrictions of the twine that trapped the thick brown mass. He had seen the girl for a bit more than a couple weeks and yet only now he felt like he was actually looking at her: those big, wide grey-blue eyes that could change from curious to skeptic in less than a second, from smiling to sad and, more often, from warm and sympathetic to distant and cold. He had seen those cold eyes more than he had ever wished to, and he knew he would’ve seen them again, although he was not eager to; he preferred those very few times they had looked at him entranced, full of wonder and will to listen to what he had to say, asking, begging him to show them something different from what they had seen prior. Yes, but what had they seen prior?  
“I come from Antiva.” The girl suddenly spoke, surprising Anders who barely understood what she had just said. “I came here to study History at the University of Orlais.” Viola took a deep breath, finally raising her face, while Anders finally started to realize what she had just said.  
“Wait, Antiva?” He frowned and looked at her from head to toe: “You don’t look… Antivan.” Viola sighed.  
“Not everyone in Antiva is dark-skinned, you know.” She scoffed, pretty annoyed by such nonsensical racism. It took a couple seconds for Anders to realize that he had indeed been a bit insensitive and try to make up for it with a smile.  
“Now I understand where that inflexion in your voice comes from.” He joked and the girl turned toward him with a frown.  
“Is it that bad?” She wondered, surprising Anders at how she thought it an ill thing.  
“What? No!” He hurriedly replied, gesturing with his hands. “It is very slight, almost imperceptible.” He tried to reassure her but the girl still seemed bothered by it so he added, without thinking twice: “I like it.” Those words made the maid’s lips part in surprise before a short but intense smile appeared on her lips, immediately hidden by the hand the girl put in front of her mouth to hide it. Anders felt goosebumps all over his arms: what an adorable expression! He so wished to see it again now. Should he have complimented her again? Wait, what was he thinking of now? That wasn’t the moment for… flirting?  
“I moved here a few months ago.” Viola cut short the man’s inappropriate thoughts and he turned to look at her, who was now speaking with more assuredness. “Antiva has prestigious universities but nothing beats the gloriousness that is Orlais.” Once again, Anders took a few seconds to process what he was been told.  
“Wait, I don’t understand.” He stopped her, curious. “If you study in Orlais, then what are you doing here, in Ferelden? Why do you work as a maid?” The girl waited a moment more before mustering the courage to answer.  
“My family is not… very wealthy.” As soon as she said such, she felt like she could finally speak freely. “My mother barely has money to take care of herself. My brother has gone with the Crows, you can only imagine what life he lives. My father…” There was pause. A brief one but it made Anders very worried. “My father is a merchant.” Another pause, this time slightly longer, to gain all the strength the girl had in her body to finish her sentence: “And a Tevinter.”   
“A Tevinter?” Anders repeated and he felt like he just had a breakthrough.  
“Yes, a Tevinter.” Viola nodded, bending to reach her now empty basket, picking it up, and started walking with it to the nearby bench, sitting on it, automatically followed by the mage who was now entranced by the story she was telling. “Of course, my father was not a mage.” Viola laid the basket in the empty space next to her and looked up toward the blue sky. “His family was very poor but they were not slaves nor did they want to sell themselves as such. Too proud, I guess.” A faint smile colored the girl’s lips but the man next to her was unable to do as much, catching the bitterness and sadness inside the other’s eyes. “My father was… is a smart man. But nobody would care: in Minrathous, you either are a mage or you are a nobody.” The girl chuckled. “Well, you can be a nobody also while being a mage if you are not born in the right family.” She sniffed. “What do they say? Selective breeding? Yeah, I think it’s that.” Anders looked at her shaking her head bitterly before continuing. “Anyways, there is no place for non-mages: no matter how good, smart, strong you are, you can either become a priest or a Templar if you aspire at any sort of role in the Imperium. And my father was none of that.” The man could finally understand what had brought the girl next to him to think as she did of mages for so long. “He tried to make a name for himself. Tried and failed. His family, in the end, sold itself to slavery. My father couldn’t accept his fate.” Viola raised her head, assuredness replacing the sadness in her expression. “He left his family and moved to Antiva where he met my mother. Her family was wealthy back then: they helped my father getting where he wanted and then…” Once more, sadness caught the girl’s eyes as she lowered them to her knees. “Then he left her and he did so without her being able to provide for herself.” A due pause followed those words, making Anders wonder if he should say something to ease the girl’s pain, but the latter spoke again before he could even start: “He still helps me with coin, to be fair.” She explained, her expression cold into the distance. “But I prefer to take care of myself. Although, I must admit, I wouldn’t have been able to enter the university if it hadn’t been for his influence.” The girl took a deep breath, putting one hand on the other on her knee before finishing: “So, you see, I work here to pay for my tuition. I do not gain much, of course not, but being an Antivan peasant doesn’t help getting a job.” The maid turned toward the man sitting next to her, feeling now much more at ease after telling him her story. Anders looked at her in the eyes for a couple second before taking out a sigh.   
“It must’ve been hard.” As he was saying those words, he realized that his and her situations weren’t so different after all.  
“It still is.” She reprehended him, showing one of her bitter smiles with Anders mirroring her soon after.  
“I bet it is.” He added before raising his face to the sky, looking at the couple of clouds just passing by. Two clouds swiped away by the breeze. What a fitting sight. “I understand now.”  
“Mh?” The girl immediately turned to look at the man again, noticing his eyes lost in contemplation of his discovery.  
“Why you hate mages, I mean.” He finished, turning toward the girl once again, still smiling that sad smile. Viola took a couple seconds before replying with a sigh.  
“I don’t hate mages.” She turned away, her braid moving away from her shoulder and falling on her back. “I am just scared.” Saying those words out loud revealed harder than she had thought. “Scared of their weaknesses… and of their power. Of what they might become… or what they might make of us.” The last sentence almost made her choke and she forced herself to keep talking to stop herself from crying: “The things that they do in the Tevinter Imperium… you know the stories, don’t you?”  
“Who doesn’t?” Anders shrugged, looking at the other struggle with her thoughts.   
“My father told me… so many stories.” The mage could see his partner shake in horror at the remembrance. “Things that mages did behind closed doors, officially condemned by the law but tolerated and therefore left unpunished.” A shiver forced the girl to hug herself to stop from aching. “So many lives lost and for what? A better place at the Senate?” She was on the verge of tears when a soft voice spoke, trying to give her comfort.   
“We would never become like that.” The sweetness of the man’s voice was something the girl would’ve never expected to hear. She turned to him with a shocked look, her watery eyes staring at the pained yet comforting ones of the mage in front of her. He wanted to take her hand, to make contact to have her understand that she needn’t be afraid, but he refrained from doing so, scared that she might pull away or, worse, believe that he wanted to hurt her.  
“How do you know?” Viola asked, her voice still shaking but her eyes pierced in the man’s, in search of the comfort he was so strongly trying to give her.   
“Because we know that it is wrong.” Anders explained, talking slowly, hoping that that tone of voice could help the girl calm down. “We have seen what the Imperium has done and, trust me, we don’t want to repeat their same mistakes.” After speaking so, Anders took a deep breath while straightening his back and looking up at the sky once more, a faint smile on his face. “We won’t harm anyone once we are free.”  
“It’s so hard to believe…” The girl whispered and the mage turned to see her looking at the ground, her hands clasped in front of her chest but the tears disappearing from her eyes. Anders smiled tenderly, he couldn’t resist from doing so.  
“Then I’ll help you believe.” He promised after taking a deep breath. “Even if you are to be the only person in Thedas I will convince, I will prove you that the mages are worth saving.” Viola looked intently into the sparkling eyes of the mage and a genuine smile appeared on her lips, mimicking the one of her interlocutor.   
“Alright.” She nodded, closing her eyes and then re-opening them to face the smile of the mage once more. Anders felt a strange warmth spreading inside his chest when he heard the consent of the girl, as if her allowing him to at least try to make her change her mind was enough for all of Thedas to change too.   
They sat there for a couple minutes more, turning toward the sky before the girl stood up, her basket on the side between her arm and her hip.  
“I need to take care of my chores now, if you don’t mind.” She said, still smiling, finally feeling the relief inside her chest chasing away her sorrow.   
“Oh, right!” The other man jumped on his feet, laughing nervously. “I have some things to do too myself, so…” The girl raised an eyebrow, an amused and inquisitive look scanning the man’s suspicious expression.  
“Are you going to put yourself into trouble?” She joked but she couldn’t deny to herself that she was indeed a bit worried. The mage laughed.  
“I will try not to.” He winked and Viola rolled her eyes, unable to hide a smile, as she turned her back to him and started going toward the backdoor. She stood there for a second before turning toward the mage.  
“Stay safe.” She whispered, her preoccupied eyes betraying her smile. The mage was ready to answer with a joke before the girl added, in a heavier tone: “Please.” Viola didn’t give him the time to add anything for she had already disappeared behind the door, leaving him in a weird state of incredibly pleasant shock that turned into a fuzzy feeling that put the mage in a good mood for the rest of the day.

That evening Anders came back earlier from his chores and was pleasantly surprised to see the inn completely empty except for the presence of the maid, who was sitting at a table eating a very inviting stew, one that actually looked appetizing, not like the horrible supper he was used to eat in that very same place. Attracted by the inviting smell and by the appealing bread that was accompanying the other’s meal, he walked toward the girl’s table and swiftly moved a chair, without sitting just yet, smiling charmingly. Viola, focused on the book she was reading while eating, looked up quite surprised, but not at all shocked, especially after she recognized the face of the mage, to whom she smiled to before going back to her stew.  
“Welcome back.” She greeted him, turning the page of The Legend of Luthias Dwarfson and faking disinterest.   
‘Oh, I see what game you’re playing.’ Anders chuckled to himself and waited for a few seconds, seeing if she would drop the act. It was hard for Viola to pretend indifference and the smile on her face betrayed her greatly, but she continued to read, in hope to have Anders start the conversation instead. “So.” He finally began and the girl turned toward him with a triumphant grin. “Do you always eat this early?” The maid almost let a chuckle escape her mouth.  
“I don’t have much of a choice.” She shrugged. “’Tis the only moment of pause I have, also considering that Bella is off to Chantry before the busy hours.”   
“I see, I see.” The mage nodded, while his stomach rumbled, which made Viola snicker.   
“You seem to be hungry.” She talked with a melodious yet mocking voice, which confused Anders on what would come next. “Isn’t it a bit early?”  
“I think you should ask my stomach that.” He joked and the girl finally gave in, indicating the seat Anders had already moved from the table.  
“Please, join me.” He invited him and the mage hurriedly followed her advice, a thing that made the girl laugh once again while she stood up to grab a dish and a spoon. “You seem ravenous.”   
“You don’t know the start of it.” He shook his head while taking the objects from the hands of the girl, offering her the dish so that she could pour the stew. He brought the warm meal under his nose and gave it a nice whiff. “This smells so good!”   
“I just made it with fresh herbs.” She explained gleefully as she took a cup and served some wine from the counter. “Here.”  
“Oh, but…” The man blushed as he took the cup, looking at the red liquid inside. “I can’t pay for this…”  
“It’s on me.” Viola stopped him with a smile. “I don’t drink wine, although I am allowed to by Bella. I give you what would be my share, no harm done.” She went back to sitting, taking her spoon while followed in her every move by the man’s grateful eyes. He smiled gently, almost caressingly, as he took a sip of the red liquid, feeling his buds dance gleefully.   
“It is really good wine, too!” He commented and the girl chuckled.  
“It’s the best we have.” She replied as the man’s stupor grew but Viola didn’t allow him to say anything, for she indicated his dish and emboldened him: “C’mon, try the stew! I want to know what you think of it.”   
“Oh, right.” The mage hurriedly put down his cup and took the spoon, dipping it into the uniform sauce and fishing a piece of ram meat. He felt his mouth water as he brought the food to it, tasting a fresh and rich flavor.   
“So?” The girl asked, looking at his shut eyes and blissed expression. The mage slowly opened his lids and looked at the maid almost crying.  
“I haven’t tasted anything this good in forever!” He admitted, so close to being moved to tears, making the girl laugh in amusement.   
“It’s nothing special.” Viola diminished herself while the man kept eating, tasting every single bite. “The secret is Elfroot.”  
“Elfroot?” The man asked, only now noticing the thinly cut leaf pieces emerging from time to time.   
“Yes. It gives the stew a hint of freshness, aside from soothing effects, given the healing properties of the herb.” The maid explained, finishing her own meal. “Unfortunately, I ran out of it, so tomorrow I need to go get some more.” At hearing those words, Anders couldn’t help but wonder.  
“Do you want me to come with you?” He asked without thinking twice, and the girl looked at him with wide eyes, blushing from the promptness with which the man had asked his question.  
“I…” She noticed her voice shaking while her cheeks started turning pink, a thing that made her look away, while moving a lock of her bangs to the side of her head. She smiled timidly: “I would love you to, yes.” The sweetest whisper came out from her lips, so tender that it gave goosebumps to the man beside her who felt his breath taken away for a second, before forcing himself to swallow and, after smiling, going back to finishing his meal.  
“Was it all good?” The girl asked, seeing how the mage seemed more than satisfied with his portion, while starting to take the empty objects.   
“It was amazing!” He smiled cheerfully and the other chuckled.  
“I’m really glad!” She said before hastily adding: “Now chop chop, before she sees I gave someone a free meal.”  
“Wait, are you sure?” The man asked, standing up and going to reach for his pouch. “I can pay for…”  
“Absolutely not.” Viola reached out her arm, almost touching the mage, making him turn to look at her smiling face. “You kept me company during my meal, which is something that hasn’t happened in a very long time. I want nothing more in return.” She straightened her back once more, giving the mage a blushing smile to which he was unable to properly respond, too entranced by her grace. Noticing his speechlessness, the girl made a quick bow and greeted the man: “Good night, Anders.” And so she left, taking everything with her to the kitchen, right in the moment when Bella was entering the inn. Still stunned, the mage turned around at the sound of the opening door and his eyes landed on innkeeper who was stomping toward the kitchen. Thinking fast, the mage realized that she would’ve noticed Viola cleaning not one but two dishes so he quickly went toward the redhead and started chatting with her, keeping her busy until the maid came out of the kitchen, landing her eyes on the two talking and understanding what the mage had done for her, smiling at him softly before being approached by Bella who started to give her new chores, distracting her from the adoring look of the mage. Anders stared at the maid for a couple minutes more and then decided to retreat to his room, impatient to see her again the day after, outside of the inn for once, free to speak as much as they pleased.  
 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> \- It is important to remember that what Viola knows of the Tevinter Imperium comes either from her studies or from her father, the latter taking priority in the girl's mind as a font of knowledge, no matter how much she tries to convince herself of being objective on the matter.
> 
> \- I have recently discovered that Elfroot is sometimes used in a similar way to our weed. I wasn't intentioned on making a drug joke when I wrote this piece so take this information with a pinch of salt.


	5. On Spirits and Circles

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The stroll through the Hinterlands allows Anders and Viola to get their relationship grow little by little.  
> When faced with obstacles, the two put aside their differences and show just how fond they've become of each other.  
> A short confrontation about spirits and demons takes them to speak about the Circles: are they really as terrible as they seem?

In the morning, Viola woke up earlier than usual: she had asked Bella the day off to go get the herbs she needed for preparations and got permission from her already the day prior. Immediately after work, she had laid in bed, in hope to fall asleep immediately to be fresh for the day after, but her joyfulness had stopped her from getting almost any rest. She had rolled in her bed with a very big smile on her face, not that she cared of how stupid it looked, she was way too happy to. Nonetheless, she kept thinking and imagining so many scenarios, possibilities and adventures: being attacked by bandits and saved by her knight, er… mage in shining armor; finding a hidden spring and discovering a cave behind it that would lead to dwarven ruins and marvelous treasures; or simply just sitting under a tree, making a flower crown and putting it on her traveling companion, certain to receive one of the sweetest laughs she could ever imagine. And then the night kept falling so deep, making her thoughts more intimate, more promiscuous, lustful even, and her smile softened while her eyes started sparkling as her cheeks flushed red and her breath turned heavier. She rolled on the other side, trying to escape those secret thoughts, denying herself such pleasure: he was a mage, Viola, there was no hope for them. Not to count that he was also a Grey Warden. That thought made the girl sadden a bit: a short life and one of sorrow. Was it not enough to be a mage? Did he also have to endure the pain of the Calling? The girl clenched her hands to her pillow and dived into it, taking deep warm breaths. She had always thought herself quite unlucky, but what was her suffering in front of that of the other man? She squeezed her eyes, forbidding herself from crying, her warm cheeks caressed gently by the soft cloth that sustained her head. She opened her eyes just for one instant and the image of the mage crossed her mind, forcing her to refrain from sobbing as she hugged the pillow, imagining to hold Anders inside her arms. That sole thought made her feel strangely a bit better: she could hear her heart beating fast inside her chest and she imagined to hear the one of the mage as she was holding him. At that comfort, the girl finally managed to fall asleep, her breath softening and her watery eyes drying after shedding a silent tear.

When the girl woke up, she felt absolutely fine, as if those saddening thoughts hadn’t ever crossed her mind: she was going to see Anders again and they would’ve had the whole day to spend together, roaming the Hinterlands. She didn’t even think for a second of the dangers of travelling with an apostate, she only felt like she would’ve been protected, safe from any possible harm. And that wasn’t because of what he was, a mage, but because of who he was: Anders. Simply Anders.   
Viola exited her room, tying her hair up in a ponytail and grabbing a capacious pouch on which was embroidered a floral pattern, and moved outside the tavern: the sky was still pale and the roads empty as the morning dew filled the air. Viola looked around for a couple seconds, feeling a little impatient until she heard some steps reaching closer, making her turn to see Anders coming her way, accompanying his steps with a staff and a tepid smile on his face.   
“Good morning.” He greeted her, once he got closer. Viola felt her cheeks warm up but tried to contain herself.  
“Good morning to you too.” She cheered before veering her attention to the weapon in the mage’s hand. “I see you brought your staff.”  
“Oh, this.” The mage chuckled and turned the object upside down. “This is a spear.” He winked, showing the pointy blade at the end of the staff. Viola snickered.  
“Sure it is.” She joked too. “Did anyone ever believe that ever?” Anders smiled: he was glad to see the maid laugh so vivaciously at one of his lamest jokes. He looked at her for a couple seconds before noticing that something was missing.  
“You don’t have weapons with you?” He asked, a bit worried. The girl’s laughter softened and turned into an awkward smile.  
“I can’t fight.” She said timidly, turning her eyes away from the mage’s and starting to walk away from the inn. Anders stayed a little behind before following her with a frown.  
“What?” He asked, looking down at her dangling ponytail. “Not at all?”  
“Hu-uh.” Viola shook her head, keeping her glance straight in front of her. “I have always been too weak to fight.” Anders was a bit confused.  
“Then how did you get here?” He wondered. “From Antiva, I mean. Did you have an escort?” Viola chuckled.  
“Do you think I could have an escort?” She looked at the man with an amused expression. “A peasant girl, son of a Tevinter merchant of Antiva? With what claim?”  
“I don’t know.” The man shrugged. “Money, perhaps?”   
“Nah.” The maid shook her head. “It was all about planning.”  
“Planning?” Anders raised an eyebrow, curious to know the full story.  
“I would only travel by day, for example.” Viola explained. “And would choose to follow only roads that would take me from a village to the other, mostly those with high trafficking, roads protected by guards or mercenaries transporting goods to noble houses between counties.” The mage was impressed by such an easy yet seemingly efficient planning. “The rest was all about… persuasion.”  
“Persuasion?” The mage asked, a smirk raising on his face as he looked at the other girl who refrained to widen her smile.   
“When needed I can be… pretty convincing.” Viola took a lock of her bangs away from her forehead, raising her face toward the half broken windmill that once towered over the city of Redcliffe. “Studying history and cultures allowed me to understand how to appeal to different people and how to put their favors to good use.” She stopped for a second, feeling a bit uncomfortable to explain how she had to behave to survive in the savage land of Thedas for so long, while Anders couldn’t help but feel more and more curious of these methods the girl was talking about.  
“But you didn’t use your persuasion with me.” He decided to say all of a sudden, making the girl jolt before lowering her head to the ground.  
“There was no need to.” She replied with a soft voice. “I didn’t know how to approach you, I just… tried.” She felt really embarrassed saying such a thing, seeing how it could be interpreted in a very different way. “I mean, I needed to be honest if I wanted you to be honest with me.” The girl raised her eyes to meet the adoring glance of the mage next to her. She felt her breath abandoning her chest as her heart stopped beating for a few seconds. She hurriedly forced herself back to breathing and turned around, landing her eyes on some Elfroot and hastily walking toward it, bending on her knees to harvest it. Anders just stood where he was and looked at her awkward movements, keeping his adoring smile as he thought her impossible to be as cunning as she claimed to be. Although he had doubts, he decided to pander her and waited for her to be finished cutting the plant before following her in search for more.

The mage and the scholar didn’t speak as much as they expected to, but Anders didn’t mind: Viola’s marveled gaze had left him in a state of endearing amusement as he watched her looking all around her as if she was discovering the world for the first time. Her eyes landed on the trees, then the sky, then far to the mountains and once more down to the hills that they were crossing, the road to the Crossroads leading the way. Viola was used to walking that path but she had always been too nervous, too worried of any possible attack of wild beasts or, worse, bandits, that she had never lingered her eyes on anything for long nor wandered further than the Crossroads, which is where the two lead once they reached the place. It was a silent agreement that made them move forward, spurred by the daze of the girl that kept on exploring with her big lively eyes.  
The two started moving up a hill, following a river, when Viola stopped, her head turned to her left. Anders mimicked her, frowning, and went on checking what had caught his companion’s attention: a big circle of freshly burnt grass was very visible not too far from them. The mage inhaled deeply, his expression darkening as he tried to advice to move forward, but the girl had already started to walk toward the mysterious mark.   
“What happened here?” She asked, mostly to herself, pushing her bag aside as she kneeled to touch the grass. “It’s still warm.”  
“Stay behind me!” Anders stepped in front of her, opening his arms defensively and preparing his staff. Viola looked at him with eyes full of surprise before hearing a swift sound not too far from them. The girl quickly stood up and approached the mage, looking around to see if she could find anything, something to defend herself or somewhere to hide, her eyes filled with preoccupation.   
Anders stood still where he was, ready to cast any spell necessary to what was coming, searching for it with his eyes and ears pierced. He hadn’t felt this tense fighting in forever: the life of that fragile girl was at stake and he would’ve done anything necessary to protect her. A voice inside of him, in the meantime, kept whispering that that was his chance to prove Viola that mages could do good too but he didn’t want to listen to it: what did it matter if he was a mage or not? He would’ve done anything in his power to save an innocent life, no matter the circumstances.   
These thoughts were abruptly interrupted by the roaring entrance of a wolf, whose eyes were sparkling of an ominous light. Noticing such, Viola brought both hands to her chest while Anders prepared to fight.  
“Don’t move!” The mage shouted, hitting the ground with the bottom of his staff, casting a barrier spell before the crystal on the top started glowing. Viola looked at it, the dancing flames reflecting inside her eyes before being thrown at the malicious creature who whined and scoffed before jumping onward, trying to bite the mage who hurriedly moved his staff up front, having the creature’s teeth meet its hard wood, before kicking it away. While the beast fell on the ground some feet from them, Viola looked up at the mage: a tense and serious expression was covering his face, the eyes pierced toward the enemy, the mouth stretching in a nervous line and the nostrils shaking in anticipation. Although the expression was all but reassuring, the resolution of the mage made Viola calm down a bit and helped her clear her mind, allowing her to look with a severe glance at the beast who weakly stood from the ground once more, showing its teeth, ready to hop onward again. But that attempt was never brought to action for a thunder stroke from above, defeating it and causing it to start vanishing slowly in a million particles that began returning to the Fade.   
When the thunder had struck, Viola had felt her breath stop for a few seconds so she emitted a deep sigh when she realized that the creature was gone for good. She looked at its remaining disappear in the wind and she felt a weird sense of sadness, even just for a moment: such is the fragility of the living creatures.  
“Was it… a demon?” She managed to whisper, her eyes pierced on the point where the creature had stood until then. Anders put away his staff and bit his lower lip before replying.  
“A spirit, most likely.” Those words made Viola frown.  
“A sprit?” She titled her head to the side, moving her eyes from the burnt grass to the mage who was still showing his back to her. “What do you mean?”  
“It wasn’t as… ferocious as a demon.” Anders almost mumbled those words, as if he didn’t know to whom they belonged to. “It didn’t even show itself nor turned the beast into an abomination.” His speech seemed really unconvincing and Viola started to wonder if he was being serious at all.  
“Spirits, demons, we are talking semantics here.” She replied with a dry tone. “I can’t imagine a spirit possessing a body without turning rogue.” Anders looked at the girl with the corner of his eyes. “Living creatures like us… they are like poison to spirits.” At those words, the mage frowned and turned to face the girl who was looking at the ground, her feet covered in black cinder. “Our feelings, our desires, they corrupt them and turn them into demons.” Viola took a deep breath, raising her face toward the mage, looking quite upset. “A spirit who possesses a body… it can already be called a demon.” Anders heard a voice, loud and clear, into his head screaming you are wrong! But something inside him allowed him to keep control: the knowledge that the other girl could be right.  
“How do you know all this?” The mage finally managed to ask, in an attempt to soften his rising headache. Viola stayed silent for a couple seconds, lowering her head again and looking to the ground before inhaling profoundly and turning to face a slope.  
“I have been at a Circle once.” She started to explain as she walked up the hill, followed by a confused Anders.  
“Wait, you have?” He frowned and saw the girl nod in response. The man reached his traveling companion and lingered his eyes on her: they were calm, yet a subtle sadness was starting to jade them.  
“I had questions to ask.” She narrated, while moving a bit more, skirting the length of the lake that they had finally reached, walking at a very slow pace. “I wanted to know… what it was like. What did mages feel, being locked up as they are.” Anders was more than surprised to hear this information. “So I went to a Circle in Orlais and asked for an audience with the First Enchanter.”   
“Wait, did you get it!?” The mage grew more and more surprised and Viola couldn’t help but smirk at his stupor.   
“It took some convincing.” She admitted with a shrug. “I needed to charm the Templars, explain them that it was needed for research.” The scholar almost let a chuckle escape her lips. “I showed them my papers, proved I was from the university and told them I would’ve given word to Empress Celene to promote them as soon as my work was done.”  
“You what?” The mage couldn’t help but smirk in disbelief.  
“That’s what I did!” The other smiled under her flushing cheeks. “I used an Orlesian accent the whole time.”  
“You did what!?” Anders started laughing uncontrollably. “Let me hear it!”  
“Oh, Maker.” Viola hid her red face behind her hands.  
“Come on!” The mage was almost jumping in trepidation. “Please! Just a couple sentences!” The scholar nervously laughed before taking a deep breath and giving it a try.  
“What iz thiz? A bon-bon?” She pretended to pick up a small chocolate from an invisible plate. “Non, Celene! It iz toxique!” Anders burst into laughing, not much for the accent itself but for the horrified look on the girl’s face, who had freeze framed in the most intentionally ridiculous disgusted chocolate-dropping expression he had ever seen. Seeing that her goal had been achieved, Viola began to move again, turning that expression in an embarrassed yet content smile. She waited for a bit for the mage to calm down, enjoying looking at him bended in half and trying to catch his breath before he could actually manage to regain a bit of composure and raise his face to meet the adoring eyes of the girl next to him, not noticing just how soft her glance had become. Anders lost himself in those eyes for a couple minutes, managing to calm down the laughter and transform it into a seemingly endearing smile. He straightened his back, his eyes still pierced into those of the girl who kept being unaware of how much she was showing of her inner feelings in that instant.   
“So… you charmed them with that oh-so-amazing Orlesian accent.” The mage tried to sound like he was joking but his tone sounded sweeter, almost caressing. Viola chuckled, blushing again.  
“Good thing I don’t look Antivan, isn’t it?” She replied with a smile and the mage rolled his eyes, a bit embarrassed remembering what he had said the day prior.   
“I am sorry about…” He started but the girl shook her head.  
“It’s fine.” She held up a hand, as to reach for the man’s lips. Anders froze as he saw that gesture, unable to conceive the idea of her touching him for the first time: he was feeling vulnerable for some really strange reason. This discomfort brought him to lose his smile but his companion didn’t seem to notice, as she titled her head to the side before turning and starting to walk again to reach the edge of the hill and moving her hand to a tree, holding her weight as she looked over the horizon: she could see the windmill, far in the distance, and the smoke of the houses confounding with the white low clouds; she could see the long road that, from Redcliffe, brought to the Crossroads where people seemed as small as ants; she saw the trees, the bushes and the hills, flourishing of vibrant greens, filling her eyes with their brightness, donating her a feeling of richness and splendor; she could feel the wind, caressing her face, bringing the poignant smell of wet dirt of the lake; she could hear the sound of the waterfall and feel the warm rays of the sun touching her pale skin which almost reflected the light. Anders stared at that vision for quite some time: the brown hair waved under the breeze, creating golden locks where the sun shone brighter; the long skirt moved swiftly around the solid legs while the white shirt was pushed back, highlighting the curves of the girl’s shapely body. Anders needed to gain all of his might to reach her without hurriedly holding her from behind, wishing to dip his face between her naked neck and shoulder. He was greeted by a welcoming look when he caught to her, remaining speechless at her endearing expression: the black eyelashes seemed to frame those sparkling grey-blue eyes while the fleshy lips were mildly disclosed, barely showing two white teeth. Anders thought he was going to go insane looking at the girl next to him as she turned toward the landscape once again, showing the round profile of her face, the pudgy nose and the small chin. The mage could stay there looking at Viola for hours, but he was taken away from his resolve when the girl suddenly began to speak again.  
“Sometimes I think…” She whispered and took a pause to turn toward the mage and look at him with a bittersweet smile. “That it wouldn’t be too bad to live in a Circle.” At those words, Anders’ expression darkened, almost turning into a worried glance. Viola noticed that but decided that it was too late to stop now. So she continued, turning once again toward the landscape. “When I spoke to the First Enchanter, she told me so many things that I would’ve loved to do.” She titled her head to the side, remembering the kindness with which the very elegant mage had talked to her that day. “She told me of how much mages could study, basically all day: sitting in a library full of volumes of all sorts, not just about magic. She said that they could ask for any information about almost everything and it would’ve been delivered, if the Templars would’ve seen it fit.” Her eyes started glowing. “Could you imagine? All those books, all that knowledge and what did they ask in exchange?”  
“Your freedom.” Anders’ dry voice was more than expected by the girl who smirked at his remark.  
“I knew you’d say that.” She replied before sighing. “But what freedom do I have?” The mage’s expression softened as he heard the voice of the girl saddening. “I cannot do anything I really wish to do. I cannot have anything if I don’t work myself to the bone.” She tried to keep a serene face but the corners of her mouth started to turn upside down. “In a Circle, I could finally dedicate myself to what I love and not worry about basic human needs: the Chantry would provide to them for me.” The girl lowered her face and her eyes met her bare hands. “I would also have a meaning to protect myself, at last.” She was still entranced by the show of magic her traveling companion had provided a few minutes prior. “Not that I would need it, that is.” She smiled, turning to look at the mage once more, her eyes shut. “The Templars would protect me.” Anders couldn’t help but frown: could she really be that naïve?  
“You cannot know that.” He murmured, making the girl furrow her eyebrows as she laid her eyes on his brooding face. “Some Templars are decent people, but others, most of them…” Anders clenched his fists, his heart pumping harder as he remembered events of his past. “They can be ruthless and you have no means to oppose them: make a false step and they cut your food; try to speak with them and they shut you down; try to raise some questions and they… cut you off.” Viola could feel all the pain of the mage through his words but she couldn’t relate.  
“I would see myself to never anger the Templars.” She decided to reply, making Anders raise his questioning stare on her. “I would follow every rule, no matter how strict, as long as they would allow me to keep working on my research.” The mage kept looking at her for quite some long seconds, his eyes pierced into hers, almost believing that she had made a breach into the man’s heart. But the latter ended up shaking his head with a sigh, a frowning expression accompanying his exasperation.   
“You don’t know what you’re talking about.” The voice came out in a whisper, almost a hiss, as he leaned closer to the girl who stayed where she stood, paralyzed. “You don’t know how it is to live being constantly looked upon, judged in every move, unable to think for yourself and, most importantly, to speak out.” Anders could feel his blood boiling but he wished to stay in control for he didn’t want to risk to harm the girl in front of him by any chance. “Mages are mistreated every single day.” He had to appeal to his whole might to gain the courage to think about all the things that he had tried to lock in the back of his memory for so long: “Some get raped, some tortured, some made Tranquil…” He almost felt tears watering his eyes but he managed to control them. “Other Templars work in subtler ways: they make you feel worthless, a mistake by the eyes of the Maker, almost wishing there was a way out to end our lives forever.” Viola understood that the mage was hinting at suicide and his unwillingness to speak the word out loud made her wonder just how much did he have caressed the idea in the past to have such refrain in explicating it. “So sometimes they lock you up, away from those few people that could comfort you.” The mage paused a second, taking a deep breath under the sorry look of his interlocutor who just felt the hugest need to open her arms and hug the poor soul in front of her. “I spent a whole year in segregation once.” Anders bit his lip as he was saying so. “I would’ve gone insane if it wasn’t for Mr. Wiggums.”  
“Mr. Wiggums?” Viola couldn’t refrain herself to ask.  
“A cat.” The mage quickly dismissed the matter. “I like cats.” The sentence that followed was so tender that it made Viola melt like butter and wish she could win her tenseness to muster a smile; but the dark expression of the mage that was facing her didn’t allow her to find the courage to do what she wished; instead, she brought a hand to her chest, searching for something else to say to ease the man’s pain. “Could you live with all these fears?” Anders spoke instead, awakening the girl from her own thoughts, showcasing a pleading glance. “Could you live thinking that people outside the Circle would judge you only because you were born a mage? Because you have powers that you haven’t asked for and want to use them to do good, but everyone would believe you ill-intentioned?” Viola stayed silent for a while, thinking on how to respond: in the end, she decided to be sincere.  
“I could live with that.” She whispered, surprising Anders. “Because I already do.” She laid her eyes on the man’s. “When they hear me speak, when they ask about my family… my second name is Tevinter. How could I hide it?” This time, it was her who started to fire up with anger but she forced herself to keep calm, speaking slowly to be sure of being understood. “They start asking me if I am an apostate. I reply that not all Tevinters are mages and that I was born and raised in Antiva, didn’t they hear the accent?” She sighed, mustering her courage. “So they go and ask if I ever assassinated someone. Me, assassinating someone, just because I am Antivan and a Tevinter.” Viola shook her head, clearing it from the anger. “That is why I try to hide my accent as much as possible and avoid speaking my surname out loud.” She faced Anders with a stern expression. “Don’t think that I don’t know how it feels to be judged, because I do. I just wish it wouldn’t get in the way: my origins always make it hard for me to collaborate with Orlesians and Fereldens at the university.” She noticed how the mage in front of her seemed to finally understand where she was coming from, what had brought her to the conclusion that maybe being locked up, hidden from everyone who kept harassing her could’ve been a bearable, although utopian, prospective. While he was acknowledging such, Viola sighed, turning away one more time to add with a languid expression: “So yes: if I had to give up those origins and that… thing that you call freedom for a chance of achieving my goal, I would abide under any rule.”   
“Any rule?” The mage couldn’t endure such words, his heart aching at the painful memories. “Even having someone deciding for you when to eat, drink and sleep?” His aggressive tone made Viola turn to check on him but, although he was highly agitated, she didn’t fear him, not one bit: she just felt his great desperation and felt her heart breaking at reading it in the depth of his brown eyes. “Would you bear to being forbidden to get a glimpse of the high sky, a breath of fresh air, a bath in the cold waters of a lake while the sun dries your skin?” Anders took a pause, squeezing his eyes to stop the tears from reaching his lid. He started speaking again, the girl in front of him speechless at so much pain, his voice almost breaking: “Would you accept being watched at all times with the knowledge that, at any given moment, that guardian would like to and might kill you or make you brainless just because they are unreasonably scared of you or you have tried to stop them from hurting one of your kind?” Viola felt that there was a story behind those words but she kept being silent: everything that Anders said made a great deal of sense and she understood his pain completely but she didn’t feel, in her heart, in the position to say that she wouldn’t have been able to endure all that pain if that meant to have a better chance to do what she really wished. She had only known her pain as a free, yes, yet caged non-mage who had and wanted to run from everything: her family, her responsibilities and her past. Having all of that become meaningless by giving her complete self to a Circle seemed an appealing solution to her broken mind.   
Anders waited for the girl to speak, to say something, but she just kept on staring at him with the most pitiful look, wishing that she could do something to make things better for him. She didn’t seem to understand, to acknowledge how horrible the Circle could be. The mage had long understood that they were very different people but accepting a life of imprisonment willingly was something he could not even imagine someone would ever be willing to endure. How much pain did she had to live through to even consider such a possibility healthy for her? Just thinking about that made his heart ache: he had never thought he could meet a person so deeply broken despite not being a mage. He had always thought that they had it worse, that there were other people suffering, of course, he was not a heartless egocentric, but he could’ve never imagined that a non-mage could endure the same amount of pain of one just because they were born in a certain family rather than another. Howe had been quite the example, he had to admit, but he never saw that man as broken as he was now seeing that poor girl. And the more he thought of this, the more his heart felt squished in a grip that suffocated his chest. Could she be feeling the same way? That idea made him just ache more as he raised his eyes toward the watery ones of the girl in front of him who he saw shiver when she met his jaded gaze. It was then that he realized that there was one thing, one rule he hadn’t spoken of yet and that in that moment it was the one thing he really didn’t want her to accept.  
“Would you even allow them…” He said in one breath before stopping for one second, making sure that the startled girl was listening to him: her sparkling eyes said yes. “To prevent you from being with the person you love?” As soon as he spoke, the man started to be afraid of the answer Viola could give: he saw her jolt and raise her hands to her chest, the eyes widened in shock. Did she not know? “Mages cannot fraternize.” The words came out without him even thinking them, they just flowed out of his mouth as in a chant. “Not with each other, not with others.” Without even noticing, he took a step forward, towering over the astonished girl. He looked at her, at how small and uncertain she seemed in that moment and frowned, tilting his head to the side. “Would you allow them to stop you, even from that?” Silence followed but this time the girl had turned thoughtful and she realized that so much had changed in so few time. Surprisingly, the corners of her lips slowly turned into a tender and innocent smile.  
“That is the one rule…” She said with a melodic voice, giving Anders goosebumps. “That I would gladly break.” She laid her eyes on his, looking at him with a voluptuous yet still pure glance and he felt a knot tighten in his throat. He knew what she wanted and he also knew that he wanted to give her just that, but something stopped him: he was scared. He didn’t want to hurt her, not ever. He even feared what Justice could’ve done if he had accepted the girl’s request. That sole idea made him shiver and he felt the need to run away. But he stayed. He couldn’t deny it: he wanted her too and he had wanted her for so long now, he had ached for her touch and her voice to moan in his embrace. But he couldn’t bring himself to do it. Not in that moment. He almost felt dirty, as if he had unintentionally brought her to reveal her feelings by asking his question. What he didn’t understand was that he had exposed himself beforehand and that that girl in front of him had done nothing but catch the truth behind his spoken words. She had thought about it for long enough now, had gone through many stages, from denial to anger to surrender and then, finally acceptance, until she had realized that she didn’t care what he was nor about the consequences: she had grown fond of him for who he was and now she wanted him.  
Viola waited for the mage to do something, her mouth slightly open, showing her incisors between the turgid pink lips that longed for those of the mage who was fighting an internal battle, almost certain to hear the voice of Justice yell at him that he had told him to stay away from that girl, that she had been distracting him long enough and he had to leave before completely forgetting about their mission. But Anders didn’t listen: he had tried to convince himself and the spirit within him that he was keeping on lingering for the sake of their cause, because if they would’ve convinced that skeptic woman they could’ve convinced everyone else too. He had to finally admit now that he had just used it as an excuse: he had loved the company; he had loved every minute of their discussions, even the most painful and outraging ones; and now he felt like he had grown attached to the girl, as if he had found another friend, but one that he wanted to keep closer to his heart, to hold in his arms and cherish as he had never cherished anything else before. And this knowledge frightened him: he had come to terms with his attraction to the girl but he had never realized just how deep it had become from the moment she had opened up to him, telling a tale that she must’ve had kept secret to so many but decided to dispose to him, putting her heart into his hands. He felt so special when he thought about that and wished so badly to help, to make all the pain go away somehow. He wanted to be the one to ease her wounds and make her understand that the outside wasn’t so bad, that, maybe with someone on her side, she could find the happiness she deserved. And it was then that he understood just why he couldn’t bring himself to kiss her in that moment: he wasn’t the one she deserved. What life could he have ever given to her? One of hiding, of being constantly chased, of renunciation and sacrifice and for what? A warm bed and the company of one foolish man who could barely look after himself. Hence he stayed where he was, letting some time pass as his sorry eyes kept lingering on the girl who started to realize that the moment was gone and something was bothering the mage.  
“What’s wrong?” Viola managed to finally say with the saddest look on her face and Anders almost gave in and opened his mouth to pour out all of his feelings but Justice stopped him. The mage hurriedly went to put a hand to his head, trying to keep control, and Viola raised her arms, getting closer in the attempt of helping her suffering friend, but Anders withdrew, scared that Justice might’ve reacted ferociously against the poor girl who gave the mage a shocked look, meeting his sorry expression. The man shook his head, willing to apologize but too afraid to speak, and he turned away, holding his staff with a tight grip as he used it to help himself down the hill. Viola titled her head to the side, confused: not for a moment did she think he was mad at her or that something was wrong between them; instead she kept wondering if the other was alright, if something had hurt him without her noticing. Maybe he was sensing Darkspawn? She hurriedly adjusted her bag to the side and slid down the hill, ready to support her companion if needed.  
“Anders!” She called him to alert him upon arrival. The mage, still turning his back at her, lightly shook his head with a sad expression, both hands clasped to his staff, before he heard something suspicious and stopped in the middle of the road, raising his preoccupied glance toward whatever was coming. “Anders…!”  
“Shh.” The man hurriedly replied, raising a hand to indicate the maid to stop walking, which she did immediately with a frown. It took her a couple seconds to understand and she tried to look forward, over the man’s shoulder, when she heard some voices talking.  
“They can’t have gone far.” One was saying with a severe tone. Anders held his breath.  
“If they made the ritual, could it mean that there is a demon here somewhere?” A more uncertain and certainly younger voice replied and the mage shivered, preparing his staff.   
“Even if there is, we are supposed to take care of this.” Replied the other voice, almost scolding the one who had just talked. “Are you or aren’t you a Templar, recruit?”  
“Templars…” Viola just registered the information before turning toward Anders who was getting ready to attack. Looking at him, the girl noticed that he didn’t seem in the shape to face anything and she worried that, whatever illness had caused him to flinch before, it would’ve stopped him from reacting accordingly to whatever the incoming men might have had in reserve. Thinking fast, she took a resolution and hurriedly ran to the man before he could launch any spell that could give away the two’s position. “Wait!” The girl whispered, raising her hands to take the man’s arm but not touching him, receiving a shocked and worried look from the blondie. “Let me handle this.”   
“Let you handle this?” Anders frowned, unable to believe his ears. “What are you talking about? Those are Templars, they…”  
“I know.” The other interrupted him, since they barely had any time, and moved herself in front of him, keeping on facing his direction. “But you can’t fight in these conditions.” Viola’s voice was worried yet authoritarian at the same time and Anders found himself too stunned to be able to respond accordingly. “I can distract them while you run.”  
“I am not leaving you alone!” He replied without even thinking, Justice stinging him from the inside, causing him to flinch in pain.  
“I know there is something wrong with you right now and I cannot allow you to put your life at risk.” The girl continued bossily before changing her tone of voice in a more caressing one. “Please, Anders.” She whispered, making the man shiver as he looked at her begging eyes. “Just go and be safe.” At that last sentence, that last look, the mage gave in: he nodded with his head and turned around, running the other way from where the Templars were approaching. Relieved, Viola turned to the other side and took a deep breath: with the help of the knife she used to cut the Elfroot, she quickly tore some of her clothes apart, disposing of the unnecessary fabric in her bag, under the herbs she had harvested, and, biting her lower lip, made a cut on her arm, just below the shoulder, where she could’ve hidden it easily once back at the tavern. After doing so, she freed her hair from the ponytail and messed it up, smearing some dirty over it and over her skin and clothing. The Templars didn’t even manage to reach the place where she was standing for she ran toward them, screaming in desperation.  
“Please, somebody, help!” She cried, gaining the attention of the incoming men, the older of which opened his arms as he saw her launching herself against his chest. She made tears fall down her cheeks as she pressed her face against the chest plate. “Please, ser, I have been attacked!”  
“Attacked?” The older man looked down at the girl before turning toward the second Templar with a nodding glance.   
“Who attacked you?” The recruit asked and Viola pretended to be too shocked, taking some time before responding.  
“They were apostates, ser!” She decided to say in the end. “But they are gone now, disappeared behind the waterfall.” She pointed at the mountain to the side, in almost the opposite direction from where Anders was running. “They used my blood to call a demon!” She pleaded, raising the piece of cloth remaining on her left shoulder and showing her cut. The Templars looked at it with frowns on their faces but they seemed to be willing to believe the words of the girl. But she wasn’t entirely done: “They said they would go to Denerim, ser, in a week, they said.” Viola wanted to be sure that the Templars wouldn’t have been around for quite some time, allowing Anders to catch a breath and be forgotten, at least for a while. “Please, ser!” Viola fell to her knees, holding the Templar’s pending cloth and kissing it to support her devotion to the Chantry. “You need to bring justice to the world and catch those apostates before they can hurt anyone in Denerim. They might even get to the King!” Those big eyes did nothing but convince the two Templars of the sincerity of the girl and they nodded to each other before the elder one spoke to her  
“We will do everything in our power to bring justice on this matter.” He assured Viola, lending her a hand and helping her stand. “You have our word.” Viola pretended to be relieved, making her eyes fill with grateful tears.  
“Oh, I knew the Templars would’ve avenged me!” She said dreamingly before turning to the recruit who had approached her with some medication.  
“Let me help you.” He offered and Viola grew worried that he might notice that the cut was not deep enough to have allowed any ritual to actually take place.  
“Oh, ser, there is no need…” She tried to say but the redhead smiled sweetly and went to tend her wound while the older Templar kept her still, believing to be helping her to stay up. She felt trapped, her eyes staring at the younger man aiding her arm.  
“We are here to serve.” He said with a gentle smile and wrapped up her cut after cleaning it off and applying a healing poultice, having nothing to say about the depth of the wound. “All done, madam.”  
“Thank you…” Viola whispered, still unsure to be safe from being caught in her deceit.   
“Where can we take you?” The older Templar suddenly asked and Viola jolted, unprepared and thinking about the worst, the stories that Anders had told her crawling into her subconscious and making her strangely scared of Templars.  
“Where can you take… me?” She repeated and the Templar chuckled lovingly.   
“You must still be under shock, poor lass.” He tried to reassure her with a smile before explaining himself: “Where do you live? We can’t leave a defenseless girl to fend for herself.”  
“Oh!” Viola tried to think fast and finally replied: “I live at the Crossroads, kind ser.” She tried to smile but felt really nervous: she would’ve preferred to lead them as far away as possible from getting closer to Redcliffe, but she couldn’t allow herself to roam any further or she would’ve not come back to the tavern alive.   
“Allow us to escort you there.” The older Templar offered his arm to the girl who unwillingly took it.  
Reaching the crossroads was faster than Viola could’ve imagined since the Templars seemed to know a shortcut and helped her through it, reaching the place in half the time than what took her and Anders on their way to the lake. She almost feared to meet the mage half way but, with great relief, he was nowhere to be seen.  
“Thank you so much, kind Templars!” She bowed, her hair almost touching the ground. “I will always remember your kindness.” She greeted them before starting to leave, disappearing behind a house, making them believe to reach the one close to it. Instead, she hid herself behind the wall and kept checking on the two men, waiting for them to be far enough for her to continue on her way with the certainty of not being followed. As soon as she took the road to Redcliffe, she started running: she had kept calm for so long but now her heart pumped blood at an unbearable pace. Only one thing mattered: was Anders safe?   
Viola was not used to sprint through the woods, she usually relied on resistance, but in that moment she couldn’t stand to waste a minute more. She reached Redcliffe in record time and only stopped to look around once she was at the windmill, searching for the man in the distance but finding nothing. She swallowed a ball of saliva and tried to keep herself together: she couldn’t see the tavern from where she stood, maybe Anders was already there. With that thought in mind, she hurried to go down the hill and pass some of the houses to finally turn the corner and see the tavern. Her eyes started sparkling: Anders was there. He was just entering the place, seemingly tired yet unarmed. Viola felt the great need of running toward him and hold him in her arms, but she stopped herself from doing anything: her clothes were lacerated, her skin and hair covered in dirt and the bandage that the Templar had applied on her arm was visible under what was left of the sleeve of her shirt. The girl brought a hand to it and sighed, deciding to retreat behind the house next to her, waiting for Anders to enter the inn. She looked at him with sad eyes at first, upset that she couldn’t reach him already, but soon that gloomy expression turned into a tender smile at the recognition that he was alright and that the Templars wouldn’t have bothered him for quite some time.   
Once she had waited for some long minutes, Viola was sure that Anders must’ve had retired in his room so she went to the backdoor and sneaked inside, trying to hide from the customers that already filled the inn at the beginning of the sunset. She tried to rush to her room but a sudden hand stopped her.  
“What happened to you?” Bella asked as the girl turned with a surprised expression on her face. The redhead looked at the maid from head to toe and furrowed her eyebrows, demanding an explanation.  
“It is nothing.” Viola whispered, pulling her arm away from the other’s grip, hoping she wouldn’t notice her wound. “I just fell.”  
“You just fell?” It was hard for Bella to keep her voice down, seeing how her employee was reduced. “Did you fall in a wolves’ den?” Viola tried to laugh but could barely put up a smile.  
“I am fine, really.” She assured, automatically taking a hand on her wound in the attempt to hide it, but actually bringing attention to it. “It’s just some dirt.”  
“What is that?” The innkeeper pointed at her shoulder, her fiery eyes scanning her accurately.   
“It’s nothing.” Viola tried to be dismissive but Bella didn’t accept any excuse and hurried to take her hand away to see her bandage.  
“Viola!” She frowned, almost raising her voice too high in front of the customers, and the other girl begged her to lower her voice with a grimace.  
“I swear, it’s just a simple cut.” She decided to show her wound to the inn’s keeper who actually calmed down. “See? Nothing serious. Some Templars helped me tend to it.”  
“Templars?” Bella furrowed her eyebrows as her expression grew darker. “Are they coming here?”  
“No!” Viola assured her, gesturing with her hands. “I swear, they won’t bother you, I promise.” She brought a hand to her heart, as to swear an oath. “I led them far from here. They went east of the Crossroads.” Bella listened to those words and then stopped a few seconds to think, carefully. In the end, she decided that she had heard enough and sighed, relieved that everything seemed in its place.  
“Go clean yourself.” She indicated to her employee with a nudge of the head. “There are many customers tonight, I need your help.” Viola didn’t make the woman repeat it twice: she nodded and rushed to her room to make herself presentable again.

That night, when she was serving the tables, Viola seemed more focused than usual: the great emotions she had felt during the day had cooled down, turning her into a state of semi-vigilance that made her feel quite lightheaded, as if she was almost in trance. She was working swiftly, almost mindlessly, faster and more precisely than she had ever worked before, when she was abruptly brought back to senses by a whisper.  
“Viola.” She heard a first time and turned around to see that nobody was there. She frowned and started to move away when she heard the voice again: “Viola, I am here.” This time, she looked to the left, at the thick wooden column that separated the tavern from the kitchen, and saw Anders laying against it, a serious grimace painted on his face. All of a sudden, the girl felt a knot creating in her stomach but she decided to ignore it and approached the mage who straightened his back and looked down to her. “Are you alright?” At listening those words, said in such a preoccupied yet severe tone, Viola felt her knot tighten and her breath become heavy.  
“I am fine.” She managed to whisper before swallowing and raising her eyes, mustering the courage to ask, in the sweetest voice: “Are you alright, too?” Anders felt goosebumps all over his body.  
“I am unharmed, yes.” He started and took a pause to find the strength to add: “And only thanks to you.” Viola flushed and couldn’t hide a smile.  
“I just did what I thought right.” She managed to say, lowering her glance, unable to sustain the one of the man. “I couldn’t allow them to take you away.” Viola couldn’t believe she had managed to say those words out loud but she was secretly very proud of it; she would’ve been even prouder if she had seen the mage’s cheeks turn red too. “But we can’t talk about this here.” The girl then added in a rush, finally raising her eyes toward the man again. “I have lots to do and there are too many ears.” As she was saying such, she started to move away to get back to her duties but Anders quickly went to stop her.  
“Wait!” He said, in a panicking voice, grabbing her wrist, touching her for the first time. Viola snapped her head to look at him with a shocked glaze, but she didn’t pull her hand away. She started shaking but she could feel the mage’s hand shake too on her bare skin. “Wait…” Anders repeated once again, almost unsure on what to say after: he was loving that moment, even if it felt so embarrassing and painful; he almost wished time to stop itself right in that instant to allow him to enjoy that emotional wave just a bit more. But the inquiring eyes of the girl forced him to give her an explanation and release her, causing the girl to feel lost for a second, in search of the man’s touch once more. Anders cleared his throat and tried to regain a composure to say, in the firmest voice he could manage to muster in that delicate moment: “Meet me in my room tonight.” Those words made the girl’s cheeks flush of a bright red and she turned her face the other way in the desperate attempt to hide it.   
“I…” She stuttered, unsure on what to reply. “I don’t know if I can…” Her hands were shaking, she could feel it against her body, but she was trying to stop it: she didn’t want the man to think she was afraid of him. On the contrary…  
“I will leave the door open.” The mage continued, wondering if he had misunderstood everything that had happened that day and just royally screwed up. “I will wait for you.”   
“Anders…” Viola raised her eyes again, almost begging him: they both knew what that invitation was supposed to mean and she needed to be sure that he wanted to do it too. The man looked at her in those big sparkling eyes and almost gave in to kissing her there and then, pushing her against the column, making her plate fall to the ground with a thud and having everyone’s eyes pointed at them.   
“You don’t have to come.” He started to leave instead, sure that he would’ve not been able to resist much longer. “But I’ll be there.” And with those words he went away, checking on Viola over his shoulder before heading to the stairs and disappearing behind the right corner. Viola stood there for about one minute more, wondering if she was ready for a such a great step. Only one way to find out, she said to herself in the end, going back to tend her chores.

Later that night, Anders was sitting on his bed, taking deep breaths to try to keep calm: he had shifted from denying the invitation he had made to feeling the urge to run out of his room and pulling the maid into his arms; from itching to rush and lock the door, regretting what he had done, for fear of hurting the other, to wondering why she hadn’t come already, a knot in his throat hurting him when he swallowed. Maybe it was all a mistake, a misunderstanding: those vibes, those… feelings; maybe it was just him and all in his head. After all, she feared mages so much, she wanted to lock them up, she didn’t understand their pain. Anders frowned and scratched the bridge of his nose: why did he invite her over, then? If he really thought that she hated mages so, he could’ve never been this attracted to her, could he? The mage was confused and torn, so much so that he almost thought of quitting. He stood up and looked at the candle next to his bed: maybe it was time to blow it off and call it a day. He sighed, relieved and disappointed at the same time, when he heard the screeching of the door slowly opening. Breathless, he turned around to see her: Viola was standing in front of the door, closing it without turning her back to the mage; her hair was freed by the braids and ponytails that usually constricted it, falling on her chest in coppery waves; she was wearing a white long vest and nothing else. Anders swallowed, unable to speak.   
Viola took a lock of hair away from her blushing face, only lightened by the dim, warm orange light of the candle.   
“You came.” Anders finally managed to say, his voice coming out in a choked whisper, which he tried to cover up by clearing his throat. When he got a grip of himself, the man started to realize that something was off: Viola was standing where she was, her hands clasped together in front on her, the soft glance turned toward the ground. She seemed in discomfort and Anders couldn’t help but feel the same way, biting his lip wondering if that had been a mistake. “Listen, what you did today...” He started saying, his thoughts fueled by the tension in the air. “It was foolish.” Hearing those words, the maid furrowed her eyebrows and turned her glance toward the mage, almost glaring at him. “I should’ve never allowed you to risk so much for me.” Viola was utterly speechless: that is what he thought would’ve helped them loosen up the mood? She grunted, unable to resist her distress, breaking her hands apart and clenching her fists.  
“I didn’t want you to fight them.” She managed to reply, unable to look at the man directly without scolding him with her eyes. “Too much blood has been already shed between mages and Templars.”  
“They will probably come looking for me soon.” Anders retorted but titled his head with a questioning look when he noticed the smirk on the other’s lips.  
“Not for quite some time, no.” Viola assured him, turning her sharp glance at the mage. “I told them you went to Denerim and that they will find you there.” She straightened her back, putting a lock of hair behind her ear. “Nobody will come searching for you here.” Anders had to admit: that girl had surprised him greatly; when she had initially told him, he hadn’t believed her to be as persuasive as she had claimed to be, but seeing her unharmed and now knowing that she had managed to trick the Templars into going so far made him realize that she must’ve been as resourceful, if not more, as she claimed to be.  
Although these thoughts helped him relax, the sense of justice inside him kept telling him that what he had allowed the girl to do for him had been quite unfair.  
“Thank you for that.” He said between his teeth, making the other turn her smug expression into an annoyed grimace once more. “But you still shouldn’t have. Why even…”  
“Are you really asking me why!?” The other finally scoffed, her wide eyes pierced into the other’s shocked expression: he had never thought she could snap the way she did and just stared at her, lost for words while his heart was beating heavily into his chest. “I don’t know either, okay?” Viola felt all her energies abandoning her after that quick rush of adrenaline had made her whole body thrill. She lowered her eyes, in search of words that tasted bitter into her mouth. “I just… didn’t want anything to happen to you. No!” She hurriedly interrupted herself, causing Anders to almost jolt as she raised her severe, cold eyes toward him once more. “I don’t want anything to happen to you.” She stared at him for a while, her expression sorrowful yet proud, then she sighed. “I don’t know why I grew so attached to you.” She chuckled: “We disagree on everything.” She passed a hand on her forehead and down to her cheek. “I should want you to be locked up.” She shook her head, still smiling but feeling tears coming to her eyes. “And yet, I want you to be free. I want to talk to you, to argue with you. I don’t care.” A smirk that tried to hide a great sweetness appeared on her face. “We will never agree, I accepted that and it’s fine. As long as I can keep being with you, as long as you are…” Content was the word she wanted to say but she looked at the mage and wondered: was he content, serene, happy as she was when they were together? Just seeing him would make the girl’s heart beat faster, hearing his voice make her speechless, cause his laughter touch the very Golden City with the tips of her fingers. But did he feel the same? Or at least just an ounce of it? Viola had never been in love: she had read many books about it and could almost pinpoint the symptoms but did never experience such feelings on herself. Was it supposed to be so painful yet desirable? It felt like torture, especially with the knowledge that there was no future for anything that would’ve come. A mage was not a favorable partner, not to talk about a Grey Warden: their short life spawn, their pain, the possibility of being drawn by Darkspawn at any giving moment. All of this had to be added to the consideration of how the two companions saw each other’s lives: Anders longed for freeing all mages, Viola for peace and stability which would’ve not been accomplished if the mages would’ve been freed. She was weak, unable to help the mage, even if she wanted to, so she had already surrendered to the knowledge that, at some point, the two would’ve gone their separate ways and that was fine: she just wanted to be with him, at least for one day, at least for one night.  
“The truth is…” Viola spoke again after this long digression crossed her mind, just like a flash. “That, even if I can’t logically explain it, I want you to be safe.” The words that she had told herself in those days came back into a wave of emotion and drowned her, forming a knot in her throat while tears watered her eyes. “Even if that means risking my own life.” Anders, who had been checking on her every movement and change of expression, was still unable to articulate any high thought on the matter: he was confused by her words and didn’t understand what the maid expected him to think. He was overwhelmed by the girl’s emotions and torn by what his body was begging him to do and what his mind kept on whispering in advice: torn between running to her and taking her there and then or questioning on the meaning of her words. He didn’t do either of them as he stayed where he was, watching the other bite her lip and fidgeting with her fingers in discomfort until she let out an exasperated sigh.  
“I am sorry.” She managed to mumble while reaching for the handle of the door, her hands shaking. “I shouldn’t have come here.”  
“Wait, please!” The mage didn’t even have time to realize what he had just said when he saw the girl petrifying were she stood. He had to add something, he had to make it better. He tried to think quickly but everything felt inappropriate or unnecessary. “I am glad you did.” Those words thrown like that made the girl smile bitterly: she wasn’t sure she felt the same way. Viola turned to look behind her shoulder and saw the mage still unable to speak properly.   
“I am glad you are safe.” The maid said, trying to end that unpleasant visit with a lighter tone. “Please: always be.” And with these words, she left the room, closing the door behind her back and resting against it grasping for air. She tried not to cry but the feeling of emptiness that accompanied her was undeniable: after such encounter, she knew their ways would’ve parted and they would’ve never met again. With this knowledge, she didn’t resist from sobbing, cursing herself from falling for such a man and, most of all, realizing that she might have gladly given her life for him, given the case.   
Wiping away her tears with the sleeve of her dress, the girl finally decided to leave for her room while Anders, that had heard her crying while leaning on the other side of the door, let himself slide to the ground, taking his head in his hands: he had been an idiot, a huge idiot. He should’ve never talked to her, never invited her, never lead her on. Justice was right.   
That night, he crawled in his bed but remained sleepless: he would’ve left the same morning. He couldn’t bare the idea of seeing Viola so disrupted because of him. Even though that broke his heart, he couldn’t help but feel that his choice was harder than he wanted to admit: part of him wanted to stay, almost say screw everything and just get a nice house, a cat and spend the rest of his life with that adorable, intelligent and lovable girl. Lovable. He tried to smile at that word but only managed to sigh.  
He rolled to the other side of the bed, looking at the embroidered pillow right under him. He closed his eyes and buried his head into it, trying to suffocate his thoughts once and for all.


	6. On Possession

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> An unexpected event threatens the lives of Viola and of everyone staying at the tavern, proving once more how frightening mages can be.  
> It is the last straw and Anders cannot stall anymore: it is time to leave, but not without at least a warm goodbye.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> NSFW, explicit smut is finally here. Enjoy.

The day after, Viola was in terrible shape: her hair was messily tied in a loose braid and big bags had formed under her tired eyes. She walked into the main room of the tavern and casually looked up the stairs: was Anders still there or was he gone already? The girl shook her head, unwilling to think about it as she had already spent long hours mourning the mage’s departure, and she started brushing the floor in attendance for customers.  
The maid waited anxiously through the whole day to catch a glimpse of the mage for one last time but, no matter how many long hours passed, he never showed up. Viola came to the conclusion that it was really over: he had to have left in the early morning or that same night, even. A great sadness kept accompanying the maid during the rest of the day, unable to think about anything else.  
The evening was normally busy: a couple of residents coming for a chat, some travelers asking for a room and a warm meal and three or four guards checking the place as usual, uninterested in actually doing their job and coming around as for routine. Viola was serving one of said guards when, suddenly, the main door opened with a bang, causing all the customers of the tavern to stand from their sits and take some steps back while the guards unsheathed their swords.  
“Step back!” A trembling voice warned as the dust began to settle, revealing a man standing at the door, wearing green robes and pointing a shining staff all around, first at Bella, then at the guards and then toward the customers who started screaming, trying to hide under the tables or in the corners. Listening to all that chaos, the mage panicked even more, raising his weapon higher and making the guards start to approach him. “I said step back!” He screamed, hitting one of them with a fireball, knocking them unconscious with one hit.  
“Seize him!” One of the guards ordered and, while the three rushed to surround the mage, Viola hurried to hide behind the counter, kneeling to the ground. The fight was ferocious but short: the mage was incredibly powerful; even more than Viola had imagined anyone could ever be. She curled on herself, hoping that it would end soon, but when it did the outcome saw all the three guards left lying on the ground, dead. The maid felt tears coming to her eyes, sure that her life was over, when she heard a voice coming from behind her back.  
“Stop this!” The known voice thundered and Viola turned toward it with wide eyes: she saw him, Anders, standing on top of the stairs, holding his staff right next to him. “This is not what you want!” He started going down the stairs, looking directly to the other mage who seemed to shake even harder before getting a grip and pointing his staff toward him, making him freeze where he was.  
“One more step and I will kill you, too!” The man shouted and Anders remained silent to gather his thoughts.  
“Why would you kill me?” He tried to reason, keeping calm. “I am a mage, just like you.”  
“I don’t know you!” The other screamed back, sweat shining on his forehead. “You could be with them?”  
“I could be with them?” Anders frowned. “Who? The Templars?” The other mage didn’t answer but it was easy to see in his eyes that the answer was yes. “I am not a Circle mage, if that’s what you fear. I am an apostate, just like you.”  
“You are nothing like me!” The man in the green robes started circling around the room, making Anders do the same to not lose eye contact and be taken aback.  
“Why are you attacking these people?” He tried to keep him busy while he was searching for a way to let him drop his guard down. “What have they done to you?”  
“They will cage me, again!” The other snapped, shaking his head violently. “But I won’t allow them.” His eyes grew suddenly colder, as he moved one of his hands close to the other. “They won’t be able to hurt me any longer!” And as he said such, he cut his skin, quickly using his blood to enhance his power, having now enough to revive the guard just below him to fight for him. Anders immediately answered that threat by freezing it with an ice spell, directing his second lighting attack toward the other mage who had already moved away, sliding behind the counter for protection. Meanwhile, the undead guard had freed itself from its ice prison and threatened Anders, who swiftly erected a barrier to protect himself and those around him before launching more ice attacks that slowed down the enemy so much that their attacks became easily avoidable, allowing Anders to finish him off with a few more spells. Once more, the blondie raised his eyes to search for the other mage but his glance landed on Viola who was looking at him with a mix of fear and relief, unable to realize that the danger was right upon her.  
“Viola!” Anders reached out his hand and, without even thinking, the girl rushed to grab it, right before the other mage could cut her off with a fire spell. Anders made the girl curl inside his arm before launching back an angry lighting spell, missing the other just for an inch.  
“You are fast.” The voice of the enemy suddenly sounded deeper and much calmer, making Anders’ frown darken. “I could almost take more life, more power.”  
“You are an abomination!” The blond finally realized as he saw the man’s eyes losing color and starting to shine eerily.  
“Took you long enough to realize.” The demon laughed while he turned the green robed mage into a demonic creature. Viola looked at it terrified, clenching her hands to Anders’ robe, almost burying her face into his shoulder.  
“Viola.” The mage called her and the girl looked up to him with frightened eyes. “Go hide somewhere.”  
“But…” She tried to retort that she felt much safer there, with him, but the other pushed her away, his eyes and part of his skin turning blue.  
“Go!” He shouted at her, with a much deeper voice than usual, before launching himself against the enemy. Viola clasped her hands on her chest but quickly realized that she had to do as he asked: she ran away, sliding down a table where many customers were hiding, where Bella protectively hugged her, trying to give her courage. But Viola didn’t care much for herself in that moment: her eyes were pierced toward the mage fighting the abomination, his spells more precise and powerful than ever, while the creature tried to overcome him without success. The maid didn’t know what had happened to her companion but she felt that something was different yet it wasn’t necessarily bad. She was looking at him fighting with such might she had never even imagined he possessed and she felt like nothing bad could happen. An extreme sense of annulment possessed her, as if she could feel nothing, entranced as she was by the man’s power.  
After pushing the abomination away for the third time, Anders managed to knock it off with a fire spell, causing it to start fading away. The small crowd that had assisted to the frightening event slowly began to realize what had just happened and that it was over but instead of cheering for the blonde’s victory, they took their chance to hastily leave the tavern. Seeing the commotion, Justice was already moving to go and eliminate the potential threats but a voice distracted him.  
“Anders!” Viola ran toward the man who turned to her as she dived her face into his chest, hugging him strongly. “You saved us!” Her chirping voice made the man regain control over himself, pushing Justice back to its place. He looked down at the brown cascade of the girl’s hair and felt breathless.  
“There is nothing to celebrate, I fear.” Bella came closer before the man could lay a hand on the maid who jolted and turned toward the inn’s keeper.  
“What do you mean?” She asked in a whisper, her eyebrows furrowed in astonishment.  
“Everybody saw what you really are.” The other explained what the mage already knew but Viola listened to her without understanding, still amazed by the man’s actions. “After what happened here, they will quickly forget you have saved them and the Templars will be searching the tavern through and through.”  
“But Anders…” Viola tried to defend him but the mage interrupted her.  
“I won’t have the Templars storm this place.” He promised to Bella. “That abomination made enough damage.” With this said, he started to take his leave but found himself held back by Viola’s hands still clenching to his side.  
“You can’t just leave now!” She complained: she looked exactly like a little kid who was being separated by her most cherished possession. Anders looked at her with a painful glance.  
“I don’t have a choice.” His voice came out choked and Viola was ready to retort but Bella’s voice stopped her.  
“You need rest before your departure.” She moved toward the sprung door and tried to close it the best she could. “I will close the inn for today. Viola and I will try to salvage what’s possible. We will serve you a free meal as thanks for what you have done.” She turned at the maid with a serious glance. “Understood?”  
“Yes, madam.” Viola nodded vigorously and ran to the kitchen to prepare the meal, leaving Bella and Anders alone.  
“I know what’s going on.” The redhead glared at the mage, whose heart skipped a beat. “You will treat her right, understood?” Anders wanted to retort, explain that things weren’t as she thought, but looking into her eyes he understood that she probably knew more than he knew himself. So he nodded in agreement before starting to help flipping back the chairs and tables.  
Once the tavern had gotten back a decent appearance, Viola served the mage a warm meal before Bella dismissed him, assuring that she and her maid would’ve kept an eye on anyone who might have come searching for him while he prepared his leave. With a gloomy expression, the man had thanked both women and reached for his room with Viola looking at him with a bittersweet smile that caused Bella to sigh.  
“You should talk to him one last time.” She suggested, taking away the dish and cup used by the mage. Viola looked at her with wide eyes before sweetening her expression and smiling as thanks. 

Anders was nervously going through his things, deciding what to take with him and what to leave behind. He was going over some amulets when he heard the door opening and gave a look behind his back, noticing Viola closing the door gently. Just looking at her made his heart grow heavier and he tried to keep himself busy to stop from thinking.  
“So you’re actually leaving.” The girl’s voice broke the silence and she cleared her throat, realizing that was she had just said wasn’t exactly smart. “I mean, I knew you would have but…” She brought a hand to her chest, feeling a strange knot forming in her belly. “For some reason I hoped, I thought that you would’ve been here longer.” She timidly smiled, titling her head to the side with a languid look on her face. “When that abomination attacked, I thought it was over, for all of us.” She sighed and then turned her face toward the man who had unintentionally stopped from sorting his things out, too entranced by the melodic sound of the other’s voice. “I was so happy to see that you had stayed.” Viola’s voice almost broke. “So happy to be able to see you again, especially after…” But the girl couldn’t add a syllable more: the mage turned toward her rapidly, taking three long steps to reach were she was standing, the girl looking at him with wide eyes, before having her face cupped and her lips ravenously captured by his. She instinctively closed her eyes and put her hands on the man’s wrists, begging him for air, just for one moment, in which she could feel her warm breath escaping her lips and mixing with the man’s, who gave her no more than a second before going back to kiss her, his right arm wrapping her waist while the left hand landed on her nape. Viola was violently shaking from the shock, now pushing her hands against the man’s chest until her fingers clenched to his robes and started pulling him closer instead, desiring his contact more and more.  
Her initial surprise began to rapidly fade away as she pushed her body against the other’s, making him moan in desire as he parted from the kiss, unable to resist. His hand went searching for the ribbon that was keeping Viola’s hair together and he swiftly unfolded it as soon as it was found, freeing the voluminous mass of wavy chocolate on her back, which he went back holding while he was pushing his weight on her, wishing to lose himself inside of her, their hug not enough to satisfy his need.  
Viola was highly inexperience on everything that would have come but she had long decided that she was ready, she wanted to give in and the man that was holding her right there was the one she had chosen. Her uncertain hands tried to escape from the weight of the two bodies pushed against one other and landed on the man’s neck. Viola shivered at the sensation of her fingertips touching Anders’ bare skin and she stopped in trepidation when she reached his jawline, feeling the growing beard gently brush against her delicate hand. With her eyes close, her touch had become a thousand times more sensitive and she longed to use this new feeling to test herself. Taking courage, she pushed her lips harder against the man, pulling his face closer and trying to take control, which Anders allowed her to do, a bit surprised but certainly intrigued. Viola straightened her back and moved on her tip toes with Anders trying to help her, pushing her up a bit. She opened her mouth and let her tongue meet his. That sole choice made her shiver harder of an indomitable passion and she ran her fingers in his hair, reaching his ponytail and freeing it so to lose her hand into his golden locks: she ran into them deep, reaching his nape and holding it to keep the man still as she used her free hand to reach his belt, lingering on it for a second before the man pulled away to allow her to unbuckle and get rid of it, permitting her hand to crawl on his chest up to his shoulder and push away his coat, Anders helping with the other sleeve by rapidly breaking their hug and kiss before immediately going back to cupping the girl’s face before starting to kiss her lips once more and going all over her cheek, her jaw, her neck, where he landed his lips several times, adoring every little moan coming out from her throat, and then down her shoulder, revealing it by unlacing the knot on her white shirt that now laid loose on her left arm. Viola allowed him to reach her chest, her head abandoned back, tasting every single movement of the mage who hesitated once his forehead leaned on the girl’s sternum while his lips longed for kissing her breasts, pressed one against the other by her arms that welcomingly accompanied Anders’ shoulders down on her body. The man couldn’t resist her any longer so he picked her up, her arms wrapping about his neck in surprise, pressing his face against her florid chest, and he turned on himself, blindly moving toward the bed against which he kneeled to let the girl slide to lay on it, opening her arms and making them fall on the sides of her head, her revealing chest moving up and down, eagerly grasping for air.  
For the first time, Viola managed to open her sparkling eyes, inebriated by the intoxicating passion that had taken every inch of her mind and body. She looked up to the man who was right above her, holding himself with the arms stretching at the sides of the woman, sitting on the bedside.  
Anders’ eyes looked hesitant but his vibrating lips betrayed his lust. Viola looked at him, at his messy hair and overwhelmed expression, and could only warmly smile: she raised a hand and reached for his cheek that he eagerly pressed against her palm, laying his own hand against hers. Viola smiled.  
“I’ve been dreaming of this moment for so many nights.” She admitted languidly and, after a moment of surprise, the mage’s heart started beating again, faster than ever, as his glance sweetened, turning almost sorrowful. He moved his thumb on the woman’s knuckles, hardly able to breath as he contemplated her simple yet charming beauty, especially now that she defenselessly laid on the bed, her scattered clothes barely covering her naked skin.  
“I always thought…” The man started but chuckled in embarrassment before continuing. “I always thought you wanted nothing to do with me.” Saying those words out loud made his heart ache but the sweet release made his chest lighter, especially when he saw the girl under him lovingly shaking her head.  
“I thought the same about you.” She whispered before sitting up, closing the distance between her and the mage, their noses almost touching as she stared deeply into his coppery eyes. “I still can’t believe that this is real.” She whispered with a bittersweet smile. Her eyes moved around the man’s face, lingering on his nose, his cheeks, his hair, his lips. The girl passed her thumb on the lower one and shivered. “I want you so much.” She barely had time to lay her eyes on Anders’ again that he rushed to kiss her, pushing her down on the bed again, accompanying her arms up next to her head, holding them by the wrists. He kissed her deep and rough, moving between her bended legs that started shaking a bit. Noticing so, the man loosened his grip and broke the kiss, catching breath and having Viola groan for more. Hearing such, Anders sighed in relief and lightly smiled, titling his head to kiss the girl’s jaw and lightly suck her neck while his hands crawled down her arms and to her hips to start pulling away the shirt, making it slide against her trembling body and out from her head, the mass of hair scattering all around her face. Anders finally laid his eyes on those bare, full breasts and went down to kiss them, squeezing them gently with his hands. Viola couldn’t refrain from moaning louder, biting her knuckles to refrain from squealing, which Anders took as a challenge as he started sucking on her nipple harder, stimulating the other one between his fingertips. Overwhelmed by so much pleasure, Viola’s legs started squeezing the man’s sides until the girl wrapped them around his lower back, inviting him to get closer. In that movement, Anders was forced to move away from the girl’s chest and rose up to push his forehead against hers while she took advantage of that moment to reach for the man’s waist and slide his upper garments away from him, making them fall to the side. She opened her eyes, eager to see him, and finally lingered her eyes on his toned bare chest. Viola moaned at that sight, taking a shaking hand to the other’s sternum and caressing it voluptuously. Anders looked at her movement, entranced by her slow investigating circles, before raising his eyes on hers and realizing that she was staring at him with the fieriest look.  
The mage stood still where he had remained for a few seconds, enjoying every second of that pleading look, feeding his own desire with it, until he couldn’t bare it anymore: he quickly got rid of the few remaining garments he had left and went back to the lady under his body. His fingers lingered on her skirt for a few seconds, wondering if she would’ve preferred to keep it on, but he was the one to decide: he took it away, that and the last piece of clothing that was covering the most intimate part of her body. Shying out from her nakedness, Viola had closed her bended legs together, her feet resting at the side of the mage kneeled in front of her. She had turned her flushing face to the side and was strongly fighting the need to use her arms to cover herself; but she resisted the urge, allowing Anders to admire her with hungry eyes before turning to her face and noticing her embarrassment.  
“You are so beautiful.” The mage whispered, unable to resist and hoping that that sentence would put the woman at ease. Viola remained frozen where she was, but her eyes longed for the man’s who smiled and bended on her face, accompanying it for a kiss with a gentle touch of his fingers. The warmth of the companion’s lips on hers made Viola release a bit of tension, raising a hand to tenderly caress the man’s cheek before finding the courage to speak what was on her mind.  
“This is my first.” She whispered timidly and Anders looked concerned for a moment before sweetening his expression and getting his hand on a pillow.  
“Don’t worry.” He promised, placing it under the girl’s lower back. “I’ll be gentle.” The man buried his face on the girl’s neck, caressing her gently with his hair and giving her some calm as he softly took her legs apart and slowly made his entrance into her body. The girl bit her lip and, more for fear than actual pain, she wrapped her arms around the man’s back, her fingers digging into his skin, making him shiver in pleasure.  
“Does it hurt much?” He asked and the girl jolted in his arms: there was a bit of pain, yes, but it wasn’t as bad as everyone had made her believe in the past.  
“It’s okay.” Viola replied and felt the man’s lips stretch in a smile against her skin.  
“It’ll be fine.” He whispered so sweetly that goosebumps crossed every inch of the girl’s body. Anders moved from her shoulder and went to resting his forehead against hers. “Tell me if it’s too much.” Speechless from the breathtaking glance and voice of the man, Viola could only manage to nod with her head while a gentle thrust pressed inside her body, making her shake and dip her fingertips in the man’s skin once more.  
“Viola?” Anders called to her but she shook her head: it was fine, it would have been fine, she just needed to get used to it. The man grew a bit worried but decided to trust the girl: he wrapped one arm around her shoulders and took her head to his shoulder, as per comforting her, while the other hand caressed her leg gently. He moved inside of her once more and the maid cringed again, squeezing the man’s shoulders in her hug, but finding herself less frightened now that she could hear his breath on her cheeks. After a shorter pause, Anders thrusted his hips once more and, for the first time, Viola felt a pleasant shiver accompany the pain. She let out a suffocated moan that didn’t go unnoticed by the mage who understood that he could dare more. He started moving at a slow yet continuous rhythm, enjoying hearing the silent sighs of the girl slowly becoming pleasant moans and her grip losing its tension to give space to a more visceral desire that made her move her pelvis closer to the man’s, hungry for more. Anders was quite surprise when he noticed, looking down at the chocolate cascade mildly dancing under the delicate movements. He smiled lightly before pushing deeper inside the girl’s body, making her moan inside his ear, this time incapable of holding back.  
“Anders…” A sigh escaped from her lips and the man didn’t resist from parting from their hug to look at her: her eyes were lost and shining as if a most horrific fever had caught her, her lips parted, grasping for air, while her flourishing chest moved heavily up and down, inviting the man to succumb to his most primal desires. He forced himself to keep from quickening his movements all too suddenly, but didn’t resist from taking the girl and pulling her a bit closer, raising her from the bed to reach for her longing lips, received by fiery nibbles that turned into a deep passionate kiss.  
Viola’s painful start had finally turned into an immensely pleasant experience and she longed for more but was unable to speak it with words. She started moving her hips, now that she was not pushed down by Anders’ weight, making the man long for her even more than before. He dipped his fingers into her hunkers and pulled her up to sit on him, going deepest into her. Viola broke their kiss with a pleasing grunt while Anders didn’t resist from moaning between his heavy breaths. She put her arms on the man’s shoulders to keep in balance, her face bended down over him who rested his hands on her thighs, his eyes closed in the enjoyment of their bodies’ close unity. Viola was thrilled: when she opened her eyes she met the begging look of the feverish man and she took his face, leaning to kiss his lips once more, her breasts pushing against his sternum. Anders crawled his hands on the girl’s body while moving his face down to her chest, leaving a trail of kisses on her jaw and neck before stimulating her breasts once more. Caught in pleasure, Viola groaned, starting to move her hips on the man’s crotch, making him shiver intensely. The more she moved, the more he would squeeze her nipples, circling them with his tongue and fingers, pinching them lighting to give the other small neural shocks that invited her to go faster on him, hoping he was enjoying their encounter just as much as she was.  
It wasn’t long after that the girl started to lose power: she wanted more but her legs were getting weary, shaking lightly under the intense excitement. She forced herself to continue moving, but feeling her speed decreasing, Anders understood that she was close to finishing. Passionately yet still gently, he accompanied her down to the bed again, helping her legs to rest against his hips that moved rapidly, joined with the heavy breaths that came from the man’s chest. Viola was panting too, trying to suffocate her loud moans that tickled the man’s ears softly. The girl bit her lip and quickly wrapped her hands around the other’s back when she felt her body contracting all together, squeezing again Anders’ body that twitched too accompanied by a releasing grunt, immediately followed by a most pleasant moan. Viola kept her nose dipped into the man’s neck for a few instants, enjoying the warmth of his skin and the pulsations of his heart, so fast that it was almost alarming. Her wrenching hug slowly turned into a sweet embrace: she relaxed her legs to the sides and moved a bit up to lean her chin on the man’s shoulder, grasping some air, enjoying the herbal scent of his hair.  
Anders let out an adoring sigh and nudged his face against Viola’s, wrapping her naked back into his arms and sliding on the side. When Viola opened her eyes, she met the gentle smile of the other who hurried to take a lock of messy hair away from her face, caressing her cheek while looking at her feverish irises. The woman blushed and hid her face into his chest, feeling the wariness catching up to her and closing her eyes. She would’ve fallen asleep if a thought hadn’t crossed her mind: this would’ve been the last time she’s ever see Anders again. Frowning, she went to hug him strongly once again, nudging her face against his pectorals. The man didn’t realize what thought had brought that sudden movement, but closed his eyes and abandoned himself to it, laying his head against the others, feeling it move under her breath.  
Suddenly, the girl groaned.  
“Is something the matter?” Anders asked, his voice mixed between curiosity and a strange feeling of amusement.  
“I am sleepy.” Viola murmured into his chest, her voice muffled. Anders smiled, caressing her head gently.  
“Then you should sleep.” He suggested with the most tender voice but received a headshake for reply.  
“No.” Viola flushed and quickly rolled around, leaving the mage looking at her bare back. The woman clenched her hands to the pillow, trying to hide her face even more. “Because when I wake up… you will be gone.” Anders was surprised by those words at first but his lips turned into a bittersweet smile shorty after. He didn’t say a word, just moved closer to the woman and hold her from behind, covering her with the sheet. Viola gulped, the pain in her chest almost squeezing her heart, but rapidly started to feel better, protected, safe into the man’s strong arms. She closed her eyes, hardly able to force herself to stay awake, enjoying every breath the man emitted on her skin, tickling her neck.  
Anders was sleepy himself but wished to contemplate the gracious lady next to him a bit more. He looked at her flowing brown hair clashing with his blond one, looked at the shape of the lobe of her ear and then at the curve of her neck until his eyes lingered on her shoulder and her arm where he noticed something that he hadn’t acknowledged before.  
“What is this?” He asked, rising up a bit and taking a hand to it, caressing it gently. Viola didn’t understand immediately but when she felt the man’s fingertips touching the uneven skin she jolted.  
“It’s nothing.” She rapidly replied but the mage had no intention of dropping it.  
“It’s fresh.” He whispered, checking it more closely. “But not today’s fresh.” Viola knew that it would’ve been impossible to hide the truth from the mage much longer so she took a deep breath before starting to explain.  
“I told them I was used to perform a blood magic ritual.” Her voice was dry but she seemed fond of the memory she was recalling as well. “It would’ve kept them occupied for a while, at least.” She chuckled. “I know the cut isn’t deep enough but it worked, they fell for it and got distracted enough to allow your escape.” Anders kept looking at it with apprehension.  
“They didn’t do a good job treating it.” He noted with a frown. “It will leave a scar. Let me…”  
“No!” The woman hastily covered her wound before the healing magic of the man could tend to it. Sitting on the bed, both looked at each other in shock for some seconds before Viola was able to regain some composure and add with a sigh: “I want to keep it.” She pointed her eyes at the man’s who furrowed his eyebrows. “It will be a reminder.” A smile lightly appeared on her lips. “Even when you will be gone and far, this scar will help me feeling close to you.”  
“Viola…” Anders didn’t know what to say: part of him didn’t like the idea of being remembered through a wound, but at the same time he could understand and feel endearing toward what the woman entailed. He looked quite uncertain at first but then gently took her wrist aside and bent to leave a kiss on the wound, keeping it intact. The maid felt her heart melt and shyly smiled, happy that the man understood the meaning of that simple wound. He then raised his head and reached for the woman’s face: for once, the touch of their lips was gentle, lacking the craving they had felt until not long ago. Viola’s body tingled as she fell into the man’s sweet embrace, lying on the bed once more.  
They stayed there for long, silent moments, the tiredness making them unable to move or speak much longer. Viola felt her eyes grow heavier at every moment and she closed them, resting her head again the man’s chest, happier than she thought she could ever be in that situation.  
She fell asleep without even noticing. Anders remained awake for the long hours that followed, looking at the beloved woman deeply breathing under him. He wanted to speak, to whisper those words that he had longed to hear so much but he knew that they would’ve just caused more strife: separating was hard, especially now that their love had been consumed. He thought about it for long: take her with him, retire from all the fighting, from all the controversy, take a small country house and a bunch of kittens, leave everything behind, everyone, mages, Templars, demons, spirits. At that last thought, Anders frowned: Justice was part of him, now, there was no escape. He was glad that he didn’t interfere that night, probably because he knew that nothing would’ve come out of it, maybe because he could feel how painful it had been for the mage to hold himself for so long.  
Anders looked down at the sleeping one and gently covered her naked shoulders before blowing off the candle next to her. He took the few things he had chosen to keep and, after tightening his belt on his clothes, turned around, an agonizing pain inside his chest. He had loved her, he couldn’t deny it, and he would’ve never forgotten her until he’d lived.  
When Viola woke up that morning, she found the space next to her of the bed empty: Anders was missing and so was the embroidered pillow on which he had rested his head during the night. Viola didn’t flinch, she expected it to happen that way. She stretched her arms and hugged the empty space, inhaling deeply trying to catch what was left of the man’s scent but everything was gone; it was like he had never been there.  
Shortly enough, the woman stood from the bed: it was time to start another day and open a new chapter.


End file.
